The More Things Change
by ICanStopAnytime
Summary: Gracie Belle Taylor is a junior in high school. The world has moved on. Julie Saracen can't help but reminisce about the way things used to be, "back in my day." But Coach Taylor shrugs, put his feet up on the coffee table, and says, "Eh. The more things change, the more they stay the same."
1. Chapter 1

**Chapter One**

Julie Taylor, who for the past nine years has been teaching English and Creative Writing at a high school in Chicago, complains that teenagers don't date anymore. They catch each other's eye in the hallway, disappear together, "hook up," move on. Kids today, Julie says, are giving their affections away far too freely, and they risk never developing the kind of healthy romantic relationships that make life meaningful.

But Gracie Taylor thinks her big sister is exaggerating. She knows plenty of kids who still date. In fact, _she_ still dates (and she still calls herself Gracie, too), and any boy who wants to take her out still has to show up at her house, knock on the door, and meet her father.

Of course Gracie doesn't _have_ to subject herself to this old-fashioned routine. She _could_ sneak off during lunch break, or after school, to the backseat of a car, to some guy's parentless house. She could tell her parents she's at a girlfriend's house and meet some boy out someplace. She could devise all sorts of schemes, but she doesn't, because the simple truth is, she doesn't want to.

Gracie doesn't even really want to date. She'd rather be improving her marksmanship, or doing her homework on the coffee table while Dad watches game film from his recliner, or cooking with Mom, who, Dad says, has "become quite the foodie."

The problem is, Gracie gets asked out a lot. She looks too much like her mother did at sixteen - - tall and shapely with eyes that twinkle and tease and a smile that could light up the darkest cave. Her hair is just as luxurious as her mom's, too, able to hold a hundred styles, although Gracie's is dirty blonde, not strawberry.

Gracie looks like her mother, but these days she's about as sociable as her father. She's single-minded, like him, reserved except with family and close friends, and inclined to be irritated by invasions of her time or privacy. So when a nice enough guy asks her out, and she doesn't want to hurt his feelings, and she doesn't have a believable excuse, she just says, "Any boy who wants to take me out has to pick me up at the front door and meet my father." Half of them retract their invitations right then and there. The other half decide to risk the encounter.

On her first date with a boy, Gracie always takes an especially long time getting dressed in her room. She's never ready when the boy arrives. He always has to come inside and sit at the dining room table with her father. She only goes on dates on Saturdays, which is also the day her father happens to go target shooting with Dan (his best friend and Gracie's godfather). So in the evening, when Dad gets back from the range, he cleans his guns. They don't need cleaning every week, but if Gracie has a date, he cleans them anyway.

Mom says there was a time when the only gun Dad owned was a dusty deer rifle that stayed buried in the closet except for the _one_ time a year he dug it out to go hunting with the boosters. Gracie finds that hard to believe. She remembers, as soon as she could write, being made by her godfather to copy out, _longhand_, again and again, rules like: "1. All guns are always loaded. 2. Never point a gun at anything you don't intend to destroy. 3. Keep your finger off the trigger until your sights are on the target. 4. Always be sure of your target and what's behind it and in front of it," and so on. When she turned twelve, Dad took one of his rifles (he had three at the time, which Mom said was two too many) and asked her godfather Dan, who is a part-time gunsmith, to put a youth stock on it so he could give it to Gracie for her birthday.

Gracie joined the rifle team her freshman year of high school, and target shooting is the time she feels most focused and relaxed. The rifle team's season is year round, so Dad misses a few matches during football season and spring and summer training, but he's always at the High School Rifle State Championships, where, in both her freshman and sophomore year, Gracie won the individual silver. It's not that hard, she says, when Pemberton High is one of the only seventeen remaining high school rifle teams in all of Pennsylvania. Her godfather Dan tells her, "It's not that hard when you're good, either" and Dad says, "This year you'll have the gold." Dan can't say that, because his son Cory also competes, for the rifle team Dan coaches at Grant High, but Gracie thinks her godfather would be secretly proud to see her beat his son, who has taken the individual gold two years running.

She doesn't intend to disappoint Dad, or Dan, or her team, or herself. Besides, she loves shooting. She loves the smell of the gunpowder, the vacuum of silence penetrated only by the muffled sound of gunshots, the quiet discipline it requires, the way you're alone, completely alone in your moment of concentration, but then surrounded by your teammates afterwards, solitude and comradery, alternating in a timely current.

Gracie would rather be shooting than dating. So if a boy attempts a first date with Gracie Belle Taylor, he has to sit across the dining room table from her father while she gets ready. The table is covered with a white drop cloth, two or three disassembled guns, and various cleaning implements. A previously recorded football game is usually being projected on the wall to the left of the hutch. Dad always tells the boy to "take a seat, son. Get comfortable." And then he always asks, "Want a beer?"

Gracie knows Dad has a rating system for responses to this question.

"No thanks, sir, I'm driving," earns a zero. Without the sir, it earns a _**negative**_ one. Gracie's science partner, Dwayne Robinson, earned that dismal score.

Something that involves the boy acknowledging that he isn't old enough to drink legally earns one-half of a point. Darrell Meeks, who is on Dad's football team, scored in this modest range.

A laugh earns you one whole point. This remarkable score fell to Mark Tanner, who is in Gracie's English class.

On a second date, if the boy makes it that far, Dad always asks the kid a series of pertinent questions about his plans for the future, and he always concludes by saying, "What's your social security number, by the way?"

Dad also has a scoring system for responses to this question, but Gracie hasn't cracked that yet.

On a third date…well, Gracie doesn't know what Dad does on a third date because no one has yet asked her on a third date.

"I wonder why _that_ is," Mom said once, while eyeing Dad as if she wasn't sure whether she wanted to slap him across the face or kiss him.

Mom looks at Dad that way a lot.

**/FNL/**

Paul Odell does not go to Pemberton High. He lives only two miles away, but he goes to a private Catholic school. Gracie knows him only because he mows the lawn. A month ago, in March, Mom pre-paid Paul to mow it for the entire year and told Dad it was his birthday present. Apparently Dad let the grass get a little too long one too many times last year.

Over the last few weeks, Paul and Gracie have exchanged many deep conversations, such as –

Paul: Hi, Gracie. Why do you have a rifle case?

Gracie: To carry my rifle.

Paul: What, are you on a rifle team or something?

Gracie: Yep.

OR—

Paul: A bit cool today, huh?

Gracie: Yep.

OR -

Paul: Hi, Gracie. That's a really pretty blouse. Did you get a haircut recently?

Gracie: Yep.

But today, when her rifle teammate Sandra drops her off at home after practice, and Paul lets the lawnmower throttle to a stop (he still has one of those old-school gas mowers, even though, by law, they aren't being manufactured anymore), the conversation goes more like this -

Paul: Hi, Gracie. You headed inside?

Gracie: Yep.

Paul: Would you mind if I came in for a glass of water?

Gracie: Nope.

She drops her rifle case in the foyer and leads him into the kitchen. She's not allowed to shoot unsupervised until she's 19, but she can transport her rifle to and from practice. The gun is officially registered to Dad, and Gracie is listed as an "authorized minor user" on the paperwork. ("In my day," Julie said once, "you could shoot a rifle unsupervised at 18 and you didn't have to get it registered. At least not in Texas. There was no national registry." And Gracie: "In _**your day**__?_ As in, you mean, eight years ago when they passed the National Firearms Control Act? You know, I was _alive_ when that happened.")

Paul leans against the counter. It's an unusually warm day for April, and so his white T-shirt has become sweat-adhered to his muscular chest. The gold cross at the end of his necklace sways as he accepts the water glass Gracie fills from the faucet. His mop of blonde, thick hair is matted down on his head, but it still manages to curl at the edges. "Would you like to go out with me?" he asks. "For pizza maybe? This Saturday? Do you like pizza?"

And Gracie immediately launches into her rehearsed response: "Any boy who wants to take me out has to pick me up at the front door and meet my father."

"I've met your father."

"I mean _**meet**_ my father."

"Uh….okay. So…it's a date?" he asks. "I'll pick you up at 6:30? I have my own truck. Well, you know. You've seen it."

Julie would appreciate that Paul just used the word _date_. Gracie prefers the word too. _Date_ is fairly concrete. _Hook-up_ is nebulous and typically means anything from eating pizza together to accidentally making a baby.

Gracie agrees to the time. She doesn't tell Paul this, but she won't actually be ready to come down until 6:50.


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter Two**

Gracie is relaxed, focused, at home in a world she knows well, lying in the prone position, watching the bull's eye come into sight and planting a fairly neat group in it. Only one shot strays into the second circle, high and to the left. She's always pulled left.

"Damn, you're good," Cory says when she lays her rifle down, puts on the safety, and pulls off her ears. ("Hearing protection," she once explained to her nephew Henry, who looked at her with horror when she mentioned "pulling off her ears at the range" and, wincing, raised a hand to his own toddler-sized ear). "You're going to give me a run for my money at the state championships." Last year, Grant High's team barely edged out Pemberton's. The teams were tied at 2700 after the challenge period. The tiebreaker involved center shots, and Grant scored 79 to Pemberton's 76.

Gracie pulls herself up into a standing position and puts her gun and ears on the bench. They're at the private range Cory's father has set up on the fifteen acres of land he bought when Gracie was eight. Over the years, Dan regularly took her target shooting with his twin sons, but O long ago lost interest in the sport, and now only she and Cory come here with him. O and Cory are named after two Shakespearian characters, Othello and Coriolanus, because their mother Eden is a Shakespearean professor at the college where Mom used to be the dean of admissions. Apparently Mom was something of a rabble-rouser before she returned to her former quiet career as a high school guidance counselor. ("_Quiet_?" Julie said when Gracie described it that way. "I don't think you understand what Mom actually _does_ as a guidance counselor.")

Cory leaves his ears on the bench too, and they walk a hundred yards to sit on a flat rock beneath the shade of a Silver Maple tree. Dan is at the moment a great many yards to their left, under a shelter where he does many of his gunsmithing tasks when they come to the range. He legally has to be here to supervise, but he trained them and trusts them to be safe and generally keeps his distance.

("It's not fair," Gracie complained to her big sister once, "that when I'm eighteen I can drink alone but I still can't shoot alone." And Julie: "Well in my day, we couldn't drink until we were 21!" And Matt: "Legally. Because we _could_. We were _able_ to." And Julie, smiling: "Don't correct my grammar. You don't get to correct my grammar. That's my gig.")

Gracie isn't at all reserved around Cory. She practically grew up with him. Dan and Eden and Mom and Dad have been in and out of each other's houses for years. Cory and O are like brothers to her.

Cory reaches down into the cooler by the rock and hands her a Diet Dr. Pepper. He's made sure to get the one with ShugLite instead of the one with Splenda. He knows by now which of the two varieties she likes. They used to make one with Aspartame, too, before Congress outlawed it. "O started a gun control club at Grant High," he says.

Dan and O were homeschooled by Dan and Eden until 6th grade, at which point they were dumped unceremoniously into the public school system. They acclimated surprisingly quickly, though Cory, a mere high school junior, has to take one of his classes at a local community college, because Grant's curriculum doesn't go past Calculus I.

Cory and O are identical twins, but, as they got older, Cory cut his hair short and tight and O grew his long and weaved it into dreadlocks. They both have that same, mocha skin, the beautiful combination resulting from an ethnically Ethiopian mother and an ethnically Scotch-English father, and the same arresting, green-brown eyes. They're the same height, of course (medium tall), but their builds are different – O has those strong legs from playing soccer, and Cory's arms have grown muscular from the years he spent playing football.

Dad used to coach him privately, when he could, and Cory played quarterback all through Pee Wee and middle school, but when he got to high school he didn't try out for the team. There was too much overlap between football season and rifle season, and Cory didn't want to juggle two sports at the same time, especially given his advanced academic course load. He chose rifle. Dad never could talk Cory back into football, and finally consoled himself that it was just as well, because if Cory did play, Grant, which usually lost to Pemberton, might actually overtake Dad's team.

"Seriously?" The Diet Dr. Pepper hisses as Gracie pops it open. "A gun control _club_? What does it even _do_?"

"They meet after school and write letters to Congress or something."

"And why? I mean, I know he was never really into the whole target shooting thing, and he hasn't done it in years, but…a _gun control_ _club_?"

"I have two theories." Cory reaches down and plucks a Red Power out of the cooler. He doesn't care that the proceeds are rumored to fund the New Communist Party, which garnered an unforeseen six percent of the popular vote in the last presidential election. He just loves the caffeine jolt and that bitter-sweet taste. Besides, Cory once reasoned to Gracie, if the New Communist Party is using the commercial market to fund itself, it's already kind of defeated its own cause.

The New Communist Party wasn't the only surprise in the last election. The Libertarians pulled six percent too. The Tea Party and the Occupy Wall Street Party both got three percent, and two percent went to the Greens. Meanwhile, the Constitution Party, the Reform Party, the Socialist Party, and the Sharia Party all got less than one percent. The remaining percentage of the vote was split evenly between the Democrat and Republican candidate, "throwing the election into overtime," as Dad put it.

("When I first started voting," Julie told her once, "It was a lot harder for third parties to get on the ballot, and almost impossible for them to get into the presidential debates. We basically had two candidates. And I couldn't legally drink the first time I voted either!" And Matt: "Maybe it's better to vote when you're not drinking.")

"Theory one," Cory says, "is that he wants to piss off our dad."

"I'm told teenagers do that sometimes."

Cory chortles. He breaks open his pop can. (Gracie's dad still calls them "cokes," not pops. He's lived in Pennsylvania how long? And yet everything from Mountain Dew to Red Power is a coke to Dad.) "Well, your parents are pretty awesome."

"So are yours," she says.

"I guess. Though Mom can be a little insane about the cultural literacy, broad liberal arts thing." Cory is a math and science guy. His mother is always trying to get him to read great English literature and appreciate poetry and quizzing him about important periods and ideas in history, but he's always drawn back to numbers and formulas. Even when it comes to shooting, he's fascinated by the physics and mechanics and chemistry of it all. Marksmanship is intuitive for Gracie, an art, like Matt's paintings, but it's more of a mathematical proposition for Cory. Not that his lack of imagination has hurt him in the matches any. "And Dad's always making jokes in public that embarrass me."

"And theory two?"

"A girl."

Gracie raises an eyebrow. "Do tell."

"O has the burns for this chick."

("Burns?" Matt asked once. "That sounds like a bowel issue." And Julie: "My generation said hots, not burns." And Gracie: "_Your_ generation? _Your_ generation? We have the _same_ parents. I think by definition that kind of makes us the same generation.")

Cory takes a sip of his pop and lowers it. "And she is _major_ anti-gun."

"I think theory two makes even more sense than theory one. How's Dan taking it?"

"About as well as your Dad would if you decided to root for the Redskins."

She raises her Diet Dr. Pepper in mock salute, and he clinks it with his Red Power.

"So unfortunately I have another first date tonight," she tells him.

"If you don't want to date, then just don't date." These words have become a sort of mantra with him. He says them all the time, in a sing-song voice.

She shrugs. "They always seem so hopeful. I hate to burst their bubbles. And it never lasts more than two dates. I usually get a free dinner or movie out of the thing, and I never let them do more than kiss me once or twice."

"So how many guys have you kissed now?"

"Hey, it's good practice, for when I finally _do_ meet someone I _really_ want to kiss. Why, how many girls have you kissed?"

"Besides you?" he asks.

"I don't think that counts. We were seven. But, yes, besides me."

"Well you're still going down in my scrapbook as my first kiss."

Gracie can't say the same thing, because she actually tried the experiment with his twin brother first. "So how many others?"

"Two."

"That's _it_?"

Cory sets the Red Power on his knee. "Thanks for questioning my manhood."

She laughs. "Seriously though? I mean…you're good-looking, right?"

"Is that a rhetorical question? I hope so, because I don't know how I'm supposed to answer that without sounding like a conceited ass."

She laughs again. In the distance, Dan starts packing up his parts and tools. That means they only have thirty minutes left at the range before he'll want to head home. So they drain their pops and get back down to business.


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter Three**

Part of why Gracie doesn't want to date is that she figures dating is a precursor to one of only two things: sex or marriage. She's not ready for sex, and even if she was, she wouldn't have to date. She could just call up a guy and tell him she was willing, and he'd come right over. Most guys, anyway.

As for marriage, she's not opposed to it in theory. She can't imagine life without a family, without the comfort of living alongside people who know her well and love her anyway. She just knows that maintaining a marriage can be hard work, and most people aren't hard workers. At least half of her friend's parents are divorced. Her godfather was divorced once, years before Gracie was born, though Dan's second marriage seems strong. And her sister _almost_ got divorced.

Julie moved into the Taylor house the summer after Gracie was in seventh grade. Mom explained it this way to Gracie: "After Julie miscarried, Matt crawled into himself. Julie just needs him to crawl out." Gracie's sister stayed in her sweat pants most of the time, wandering from coffee table to dining room table to kitchen table with her laptop, writing some novel and making occasional verbal observations about the general unworthiness of the male species. Mom and Dad would hover a yard or two away from Julie, whispering words to each other, and sometimes Dad would invite her to the basement for a game of ping pong to have one of his Julie chats, and sometimes Mom would make her get dressed and take her out to the wine bar to have one of her heart-to-hearts. One evening, Matt showed up on the doorstep holding an oil painting he'd created and titled "Mirror Pain," which apparently meant something to Julie, because she went home to Chicago with him after that, and two years later they had Henry.

Then there's Gracie's parents. They've been married over three decades now, and sometimes they still flirt like teenagers, but Gracie has not forgotten the terror that gripped her in fourth grade – the horrible fear that they _would_ divorce. Back then, she would lay in her bed long after she was supposed to be asleep, when they _thought_ she was asleep, and listen to them fight. The walls were thinner than they imagined.

Dad wanted to move to Alabama to be a quarterback coach for some college team there. Mom wanted to accept a position she'd been offered as headmaster of a private school for at-risk teens in the District of Columbia. Dad said it was HIS turn. Mom said he'd had PLENTY of turns over the years. Dad said she was selfish. Mom said he was selfish. On and on it went.

One night Mom said, "Gracie and I can move to D.C.. You can go to Alabama. We'll have school breaks together, the parts of them I don't have to work."

There was a long silence. Gracie didn't want to see Dad only on school breaks, and yet she half wanted Dad to agree, just so they would stop fighting. She wondered if they'd lowered their voices, if they were working out the details. But then her Dad's voice came, not yelling, but resonant, with a tense, pulsing undercurrent of anger. "No. You must be out of your mind, woman, to even suggest that. Do you remember what happened last time?"

Gracie had never heard Dad call Mom _woman_ before, not unless he was teasing and Mom was teasing back.

Mom said, "Don't you talk to me like that. Like I'm your property! I'm looking for a compromise here, Eric. So we can make this work. Because you're obviously not willing to bend. You know you can get a secure job coaching high school in Virginia or Maryland or D.C. with your reputation. You can get a five-year contract easily. But this college thing, they could fire you after just one year! Why do you still want to do college at this point? Just so you can have a feather to stick in your cap?"

"A feather to … stick … in my…what the hell are you even talking about?"

"It's a _metaphor_, Eric. Do you just want the job for the respect?"

"Well, yeah, Tami, I'd like the respect, since I'm sure as hell not getting it at home!"

And Mom: "How dare you!"

And Dad: "How _dare_ I? I'll tell you how I dare!" And the bedroom door slamming. And the front door slamming. And the car starting, and Gracie, curled into a fetal position, weeping and wondering if Daddy was ever coming back, rocking herself to sleep in a sea of tears.

He did come back. In fact, he was there in the morning, asleep in his recliner, game film still running on the old plasma.

But the fights didn't stop.

Gracie didn't talk about it with her parents then. She talked about it with her godfather, one day when Cory and O were home sick with Eden, and Dan had taken her to the range alone. She'd just started using a real rifle that year – which belonged to Cory (well, officially Dan) – after over three years of training with B.B. guns and airsoft rifles.

"I think my parents are going to get a divorce," she said once they'd settled on the shaded flat rock that Cory had dubbed "the talking space."

"What?" Dan's question was sharp, disbelieving, but then his voice softened as he said, "Tell me why you think that."

And she told him.

When her words and tears were spent, and his arm was draped around her shoulder, Dan said, slowly and deliberately, "Your parents are not going to get a divorce. Your parents have been married a long time. They love you, and even though they may not seem like it at the moment, they love each other. And most importantly, they both believe in the institution of marriage."

"What's the _institution_ of marriage, anyway? I mean, I _know_, but what does that _really_ mean?"

"Institutions are created to preserve something good. Something that might otherwise give way to time." He sighed. "What I mean is…your parents know, in a theoretical kind of way, that there are good years and bad years, and the bad years are worth slogging through for the good years. They'll work it out. I know your Dad. I know your mom too. And I promise you – they'll work it out."

They did work it out. They went to marriage counseling. Gracie always wondered if Dan talked to Dad, if that's why Mom and Dad went to marriage counseling. Gracie wasn't supposed to know about it, but she asked about all the "appointments" they kept having, if one of them was sick, and Mom explained, "No, but we're doing this to make sure our marriage doesn't get sick. So Dad can be a good husband, and I can be a good wife, and we can both be good parents."

Things were tense, on and off, for a while. And then they weren't tense, but they weren't quite right either. And then one day Gracie caught Dad dancing with Mom in the kitchen, and they were laughing, just laughing, and somehow, Gracie knew it was going to be all right. Everything was going to be all right. And she ran and hugged them sidelong, and Dad reached over and cranked up the iPod, and they all danced around the kitchen together, a spastic, silly, happy mass of one.

The compromise was something none of them expected. Mom didn't become headmaster of that private school in D.C., and Dad didn't become a quarterback coach at that Alabama college. Mom and Dad both stayed precisely where they were, Dad as head coach of the Pemberton Pioneers, and Mom as the Pemberton High guidance counselor.

"Gracie won't have to move away from her friends and school," Mom said.

"And I won't have to move away from my godsons," Dad said.

"A more relaxed lifestyle," Mom said. "More time with our family."

"Who needs feathered hats, anyway?" Dad said. "This one's good enough." He patted his green Pioneer cap.

It turned out to be exactly what they needed, even when they both thought they wanted something else.

Life is funny like that sometimes.


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter Four**

The Taylors upgraded to a new house just before Gracie entered 6th grade. Mom didn't like the middle school for which they were zoned, so the moving trucks rolled in that summer. After over five years, Gracie's gotten used to the new house, but she sometimes misses the old one.

You enter on the first floor. There's a tiled foyer, and the high ceiling that is now slowly going out of fashion. To the left is the living room, with Dad's leather recliner, and the matching leather sofa, and the sturdy, dark wood coffee table where Gracie does her homework. There's a fireplace, too, and on the wall above the mantle is the spot they usually choose to project the games, Mom's cooking shows, and _Master Marksman_, a weekly reality competition Gracie never misses. They each have their own iWanderer now, so they can project on any wall of the house, but Gracie's not allowed to watch TV in her room.

Beyond the living room is the formal dining room, which opens to the right onto an expansive kitchen. Upstairs are the three bedrooms, including the master, which has a bathroom that, Mom has said, "Helped save our marriage a second time." In the center of the masterbath is a shower, and next to that a soaking tub. This makes a sort of dividing line right down the middle of the two sides of the bathroom. Each side of the bathroom has its own sink, its own commode, and its own walk-in closet.

Gracie's bedroom is just above the dining room. There's an air conditioning vent that, if she opens it, and puts her ear to it, allows her to hear what's going on in the dining room below.

She's listening now, as Paul Odell is ushered in by her father, and the chairs slide back on the hard wood floor, and Dad says, "Want a beer?"

"No," Paul answers, "But may I get you one?"

Gracie has no idea how Dad's going to score that. Apparently he doesn't either, because he's silent for a long time. He must be confused, because he goes straight to the second-date departing zinger: ""What's your social security number, by the way?"

Paul isn't in the least bit rattled, because it doesn't occur to him that Dad is threatening a background check. "You don't have to withhold social security for the lawn mowing," he answers. "I'm sure I don't make enough to be above the exemption."

Dad is silent again. He's off his game. Finally, he says, "What position do you play over there at the Catholic high school?" He says _the_ Catholic high school, like it's the only one in all of Philadelphia County. He's forgotten the name, of course.

"Position?" Paul asks.

"On the football team."

"I don't play football."

"Why not? You've got the build of a quarterback."

"We don't have a team."

"You don't have a team?" Dad echoes.

"No."

"No, _**sir**_," Dad says. (Dad's lived here how many years now? And he still can't accept the fact that teenagers don't routinely say _no, sir_ and _yes,_ _ma'am_ to adults.)

"No, sir. We don't have a team."

"What do you mean you _don't_ _have_ a team? How small is that high school? How many kids?"

"400, sir."

"Well, damn, son, that's big enough for a football team!"

"We just have a basketball team. And soccer. And girl's volleyball. That's it for sports. Sir."

"And which do you play?" Dad asks.

There's a pause and then Paul, in a deadpan tone, "Girl's volleyball, sir."

Dad doesn't laugh. Gracie suspects he doesn't even smile.

She pushes up from the floor. Time to put the poor boy out of his misery…at least until he tries to make conversation with her over pizza.

When she enters the dining room, both Paul and Dad look straight at her, and they both seem equally stunned, but in a different way, Paul appreciative, Dad…frightened? She never wears a skirt except for church, but she's wearing one now. She's also wearing her prettiest, most flattering blouse. She's not sure why she picked this outfit exactly. Maybe because Paul _is_ kind of cute? Fine. Not _kind_ of. _Majorly_ cute.

Usually when she makes her grand entrance in the dining room, it's the boy who looks flustered, having just been subjected to the scrutiny of her father, but today it's Dad who's rattled. Paul's responses were not in his playbook. Usually her Dad is as cool as a Pennsylvania November. And, once the pre-date game he plays is over, which Gracie assumes he plays in part because _she_ wants him to, he usually doesn't seem the least bit concerned about her dating. Half the time he's not even awake when she gets home.

(When Gracie told Julie this on the phone one night, Julie accused her of lying. "It isn't possible," Julie said. "I don't believe you." Gracie assured her it was true, and Julie racked her brain until she had an explanation. "It must be because he doesn't think you like any of them and that you aren't _going_ to like any of them and so he _knows_ you aren't going to do anything with any of them. You know, he wasn't all that concerned about Matt at first. It was _Mom_ who flipped out originally, but then when it became clear I actually _liked_ Matt, Dad started acting crazy.")

Dad's not _acting_ crazy now, but he's _looking_ a little bit crazed. His salt-and-pepper hair is all askew on the top of his head and he's got that wide look in his hazel eyes, and he follows them to the door when they leave and opens it for them and even watches them get in the car and drive away.

So if Julie's right, and Dad's flustered, does that mean Dad _thinks_ she's _going_ to like Paul?

Gracie turns and looks at the boy at the wheel. Paul's wearing a long-sleeve, dark pink (it's the fashion for boys this year) button-down with the sleeves unbuttoned and rolled up halfway. She can see the gold chain around the smooth skin of his neck, but the cross itself is buried beneath the shirt. He's cute, sure, but Gracie's never been shallow. Why exactly does Dad think she's going to like him?

Paul smiles. "You're making me a little nervous."

She looks away, out the window.

"I've had so much homework this year it's unbelievable," he says. "Two months from graduation and they're still loading us up. So how's your junior year going?"

"Ok."

"You don't talk much, Gracie."

She does, actually. She talks a lot to Mom, and Dad, and Julie, and Matt, and Dan, and Cory, and O, and her rifle teammates, especially Tommy and Sandra. She just doesn't talk much to people who haven't been admitted to her inner circle. She's told that as a child she was intrepid, entering the houses of Mom and Dad's acquaintances shouting, "So where are my new friends? Do you have any kids to play with?" But ever since puberty she's become much more selective in her friendships and much less inclined to open herself up to anyone who is not family. She can be taciturn with boys, not because she's incapable of bantering, but because she doesn't want them to be constantly asking her out. (She can hear Cory saying, "If you don't want to date, then just don't date." He makes it sound like turning down guy after guy after guy is just that easy. For Gracie, it's not. Besides, won't people think she's weird if she doesn't at least do _something_ with _some_ boy or other? They already think she's weird because she's on the riffle team.)

Paul's vivid smile flashes out across his well-chiseled face again. "So, how was your last rifle match?"

"I came in first in the individual portion." They weren't up against Grant that time.

"It's kind of unique, huh? You being a girl and all. That's so cool."

"What do you mean, _me being a girl and all_?"

Paul puts on his blinker and glances at her nervously. "Uh…nothing just…you know…it's not a girl thing, usually, gun shooting."

"_Riflery_."

"Riflery."

"And if by not a girl thing you mean girls aren't as good at it as boys," Gracie says, "you're wrong. Riflery is the only sport I can think of where boys and girls compete head to head. Dan says women are inherently better shots on average, they just don't choose to train as often as men do. The top two scorers on Pemberton's rifle team are girls – me and Sandra. And one of the top three scorers on Grant's team is a girl. Cory's the top scorer, of course."

"Who's Dan? Who's Cory?"

"Cory is Dan's son. Dan is my godfather. He's coach of Grant High's rifle team. He taught me to shoot."

"Isn't that like a conflict of interest or something? Since you're on the Pemberton Rifle Team?"

"Well, he's not my teacher anymore. He's just my godfather."

"So…then…when did he start teaching you?" He turns onto the road where the gourmet pizza place is. Paul keeps asking her questions. He's persistent. He asks her questions while they wait for their food, while they eat their food, while they walk through the park, while they drive home. At some point, she starts _really_ talking. She tells him about her interests – which actually _are_ broader than guns, though guns _do_ come up a lot. He listens. He tells her a little about himself, but mostly he just asks questions.

They hit on a point of commonality, something Gracie doesn't expect – they both like the poetry of Billy Collins. Gracie never thought of herself as someone who would _ever_ like poetry, but she came across one of his poems in her 9th grade English eAnthology, and it hit her so hard, in just the right spot at just the right time, that she ended up asking Dan's wife Eden – the English professor – if she had any of his books. Eden lent her three– physical, hardback copies even.

"What's your favorite of his books?" Gracie asks.

"Hmm…I think it's _Ballistics_," Paul says.

Gracie's eyebrow goes up, because that's her favorite too.

(When Mom saw the book's cover, that image of a bullet tearing through a card, she said, "Gracie, do you _ever_ read anything that's _not_ about guns?" and Gracie said, "It's not about guns at all. It's poetry about life and stuff," and Mom's eyes grew wide and excited, and she read the book, and discussed it with Gracie for days, or at least tried to, until Gracie finally said, "Mom, I really don't have anything more to say about it. When's Dad getting home? He said he'd take me to the range." And her Mom had gotten that hurt look in her eyes, the way she did sometimes, even when Gracie wasn't _trying_ to upset her.)

When they get back to the house, Paul walks her to the door. This is when the boys usually do the good night kiss. Sometimes it's a peck on the cheek, sometimes it's straight on the lips. Sometimes it's quick, and sometimes they linger, and sometimes they even try to shove in their tongue.

Paul leans forward a bit, but she doesn't meet him halfway. She's never had to before. They always just kiss her.

Paul leans back without doing anything. Then he leans in again, a little bit farther this time. Then he leans back. He looks like one of those bird things that Dad keeps on his desk in his office at school, that bobs back and forth pecking into a glass.

"So…" Paul says. "Do you want me to kiss you or not?"

They never ask her that. She's never had to answer that before. They just do it.

"Uh…"

"I'll take that as a no."

"Oh." She puts her key in the deadbolt.

"So, I had fun," Paul says. "Do you want to go out again?"

Half the time, they don't ask her out again. If Dad's gun cleaning doesn't scare them off, then the awkwardness of trying to make conversation with Gracie usually does. The _actual_ date is always far less interesting than whatever fantasy the boy had. Even when they _do_ ask her out for a second date, it's not usually right that minute. It's usually later in school.

"Uh…."

"I'll take that as a no as well. Anyway, thanks for giving me a chance. See you around." He starts walking down the stairs.

She didn't actually say no, did she? Did she _want_ to say no? "Wait!" she says.

He stops and turns.

"I…didn't say no."

"You didn't say yes."

"Uh…."

He smiles. "I'll take that for a yes. Next Saturday. Same time? I'll be here."

She nods.

When she opens the door, Dad isn't a sleep. He's standing right there. Right in the center of the foyer.


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter Five**

"He likes the poetry of Billy Collins," Gracie says.

She and Cory are sitting on "the talking space" at Dan's range. It's a little before noon on Saturday morning. In the distance, Dan and Dad have laid down their guns and are collecting their brass.

"Does _he_ like Billy Collins," Cory asks, "or does he just know _you_ like Billy Collins?"

"How would he know I did?"

"Well, maybe your dad told him."

"No, he didn't. Dad didn't say anything about that. I know, because I always listen through the air conditioning vent. "

Cory lets out a great, guttural laugh. He has that deep, African voice, like his mother. Both Dan and Dad look up and glance in the direction of the rock, but then they go back to sweeping the ground for spent casings. Dan will reload them for Dad later. There's no risk of them hearing the conversation from way over there.

"That's a little creepy of you," Cory says, still smiling. He takes a sip of his Red Power and lowers it to the rock. "But Paul's been mowing your lawn for a few weeks. He might have talked to your dad at some other time. Or he might have seen the book in your house."

"Why are you so intent on assuming he was lying about it?"

"Well, it's quite the coincidence, don't you think? And he had to come up with something. You're a hard girl to talk to, Gracie Belle. I mean, not for _me_, but…you _know_ it's true." Gracie doesn't deny it. "So he made it to round two, did he?"

Gracie nods. Her Diet Dr. Pepper is on the surface of the large flat rock, in the space made from her cross-legged sitting position. She fingers the tab of her pop can, fixing her eyes on it and lifting it up and down as she asks, "So…when do most guys expect sex? I mean, the ones who aren't just hooking up. The ones who date. How many dates before they expect it?"

"Gracie, it doesn't matter. Please tell me you wouldn't say yes just because a guy expects it. I mean, you can shoot a one inch group at fifty yards. "

"_Of course_ I wouldn't. I'm certainly not going to lose my _virginity_ just to avoid conflict."

He lets out a relieved _pheeew_.

"I just want to know when the pressure is going to start."

"I'm not sure if you know this Gracie, but guys have individual personalities. They're not a collective."

"In _general_."

"There is no general," he says,

"Fine. When would _you_ expect it, if _you_ were dating a girl?"

Cory doesn't date much. He doesn't "hook up" randomly either, because his mother's taught him that's no way to treat a girl, even if the girl doesn't mind being treated that way. Gracie knows that when Cory has sex, he'll have dated the girl for a while first. But she can't guess when that's going to happen, because he's pretty focused on the rifle team, math, and science. He doesn't have a lot of time for girls. There was one he liked last year, and he took her out, but she said no to a second date. ("What's wrong with her?" Gracie asked. "You're good-looking, smart, funny. I mean what the hell is wrong with her?" And Cory: "I think maybe I talked about guns too much." And Gracie: "What's wrong with that?" And Cory: "And math. I talked about math a little." And Gracie: "Yeah, well, that gets boring fast.")

"I wouldn't," he says.

"What do you mean you wouldn't?"

Cory tosses his empty Red Power back into the cooler. "I wouldn't _expect_ it. I'd _want_ it, but I wouldn't _expect_ it."

"Okay, when would you _ask_ for it then? Or make your big move?"

"I don't know. When she seems like she wants it, I guess. I figure it'll just happen, you know. We'll be making out and…it'll just happen." He grabs another Red Power. He eyes her strangely, like he's worried. "Why, are you already thinking it's going to get that far with him?"

"No, I just want to know when I should break it off. So it _doesn't_ get that far and I don't have to deal with it."

"Deal with what?"

"The whole putting him off thing. I want to wait until I'm married to have sex."

"_Married?_" He shakes his head, smiling like he doesn't believe her. "I bet not even your _parents_ waited until they were married."

"Julie did."

"I don't believe it."

"She told me she did and that I should too."

"She's lying. Didn't she date Matt for like four years before they got married?"

"On and off," Gracie says.

Gracie doesn't believe Julie either. She knows Julie wants to shield her from the world, even more than Mom does. Julie says that Mom, in her fifties, "has become alarmingly mellow."

("I just came across _**yet another**_ twin research study," Mom told Dad one night, "that says it doesn't really matter, in the long-term, how you raise your children." At the time, Mom, was working on her master's in psychology through night and summer classes. "Short of locking them in a closet," she continued, "parenting choices make very little difference to their long-term success or ethical choices." And Dad: "Bullshit. And you know it." And Mom: "Eric! Don't swear in front of your daughter." And Dad: "You just said parenting choices make no long-term difference." Mom: "Yes, but it _annoys_ me when you swear in front of Gracie, and studies show that a husband's choices _vastly_ influence marital happiness and in particular the quality of a certain _sphere_ of marriage that I believe is of _particular_ importance to you.")

Julie says Dad never swore in front of her when she was growing up, except for maybe the occasional damn or hell, but he's become less inhibited in his fifties. Gracie's still never heard him drop an f-bomb, though.

"You don't _really_ believe she was a virgin on her wedding night, do you?" Cory asks.

No, Gracie doesn't believe it. But she kind of likes the whole, ultra-old-school "wait until marriage concept." She thinks there's something quaintly romantic about it, and considerably less frightening than just giving your body over to some boy who might not be around the next week.

"Well," she tells Cory. "_I've_ decided _I'm_ waiting until _I'm_ married, or at least until I'm 20."

"20?"

"Yes," she says decisively. "20."

"Sounds a bit arbitrary."

"It's not," she insists. "I have my reasons. Brain development, you know. It has to do with sex and…brain development."

"You are aware I did my science fair project on brain development last year, right?"

She's aware. He came in third at the State Science Fair, too.

"Maturation of the prefrontal cortex doesn't actually occur until around age 25," Cory says. "So, if you're picking an age - "

"- Okay! It's arbitrary! But that's what I've decided. Not before I'm 20. And since I'm not having sex until I'm at least 20, sometimes I don't really see the point of dating."

Cory lowers his Red Power from his lips. "I have a radical idea, Gracie Belle. You better brace yourself for this idea."

Gracie leans over the rock, sets down her pop can, and then puts her hands flat on the rock and makes a face like she's holding on tight in a roller coaster.

He laughs. "So you're ready for this?"

She nods.

"If you don't want to date, just don't date."

She takes her hands off the rock and grabs the pop again. "Maybe I _do_ want to date. I just don't want to have sex."

"Then here's another radical idea. When Paul – that's the bloke, right?"

("We said dude," Julie told Gracie once. "Bloke was _never_ an American thing." And Gracie: "Dudes hang out on converted cattle ranches slathering themselves with suntan oil. A bloke is a regular guy.")

Gracie nods and Cory continues, "When Paul asks you for sex – or starts pressuring you or whatever – you say to him, directly, that you've decided not to have sex until you're 20. Then he either keeps dating you knowing he won't be getting any bojang…" (When the family was all on vacation together last summer, Matt said to the TV, "Bojang? What in the…what is bojang?" And Julie: "It's like when we said…I don't know what we said." And Dad: "We said action." And Mom: "Or lovin'." Then Mom and Dad turned to each other and started singing some random ancient 70's song about lovin', until Julie and Gracie both groaned loud enough that they stopped.) "…or he breaks it off."

Gracie wonders which one Cory thinks Paul will do, but she doesn't ask, because Dan and Dad are now putting away their rifles. "Looks like it's our turn," she says before draining the rest of her Diet Dr. Pepper.

"Let's move these targets out to a hundred yards. The State Championships are _**nigh**_." Cory uses words like that sometimes, because his mom is always quoting Shakespeare. He always says them in a dramatic tone, too, and Gracie always giggles.

"Very well," she says, "Then let us thither."


	6. Chapter 6

**Chapter Six**

Mom asks Gracie to dust the dining room hutch during Saturday afternoon clean-up. Dad has been assigned the toilets. When Mom's had a good week, and Dad's made her happy, he gets the vacuuming. When he has some penance to do, he gets the toilets.

Gracie grabs a dust cloth and peeks in the hall bathroom, where Dad is kneeling and scrubbing the base. "Whatch ya in for?" she asks.

He grimaces. "I told Dan I'd buy one of his .22's without consulting her first." Dan has an FFL license, so he can sell it, even though the National Firearms Control Act outlawed most private sales of guns.

"Well," Gracie said, "he _was_ offering it at $100 below market value, and it's better than the one you have."

"That's what I told her. And I told her I'd sell my other one first."

"And still…here you are." She comes over and pats him sympathetically on the head, which he hangs in mock despair. "Love you, Dad."

"You too, peanut."

("You're such a Daddy's girl," Julie told her once. "Seriously. I think you'd let him arrange a marriage for you." And Matt: "You know, two years after we were married, he told me that of all the guys on the team, if he _had_ to pick one to marry his daughter, he would have picked me. So maybe he wouldn't be so bad at arranging." And Julie: "Well, I don't think you had much competition for son-in-law on the Panthers." And Matt: "He said his second choice was Landry. Only, he said Lance.")

Gracie doesn't leave. She hovers. Dad's just begun to squirt the cleaner into the toilet now. "Hey," she says, "if you HAD to pick one guy of all the teenagers you know to marry me, who would it be?"

He drops his entire bottle of cleaner in the toilet. "Shit," he mutters. He fishes it out and then stands. "Gracie, you're way too young to be thinking about marriage." He turns on the faucet and starts washing his hands.

"Well, Julie got married at 19. You and mom got married at 20. So at most I figure I've got five years."

"You've got your whole damn life." He turns off the faucet and starts shaking his hands, because there's no towel on the rack. "At _least_ wait until you have your law degree." Gracie has let it be known that she plans to be a constitutional lawyer who specializes in first and second amendment issues. At least, that's her plan of the month. Her life goals continually evolve. "You'll probably meet someone in law school. Someone you don't even know now."

"Maybe, but if you _had_ to pick a guy. Like, if you were _forced_ to. Who would it be?"

"I don't think there exists a guy who deserves you, Gracie Belle. You are a princess _and_ a warrior."

She smiles. "Want me to put in a good word for you with Mom?" she asks as she steps out of the bathroom.

Dad shrugs.

Mom's mopping the kitchen floor. "You get to that dusting yet?" she asks. "I know you still need time to get ready for your date with Paul."

"Not yet." Gracie leans on the counter, trying not to step on the already mopped part of the tile. "Dad has a really full head of hair, don't you think?" That reminder should help Dad out a bit.

Mom slides the mop forward. "Sure."

"I mean _really_ full. Not a lot of men in their fifties have hair that thick. I bet your friends are jealous of you because of his hair."

Mom stops mopping and stands up straight, a hand on one hip. "I swear, Gracie, sometimes you say things that make me want to rummage through your sock drawer in search of pot."

"You should really buy your own, Mom."

Mom laughs. Gracie loves Mom's laugh – it's so sincere, so genuine, so…._Mom._

("In my day," Julie said once, "Marjiuana was illegal, except maybe for medicinal purposes in some states." And Gracie: "Did you try it anyway?" And Julie: "Certainly not." And Matt chuckling. And Julie glaring at him. And Gracie: "How about you, Mom and Dad, did you ever try pot?" And Dad looking nervously at Mom, and Mom saying with her eyes, "Don't you open your mouth, Eric Taylor. Don't you dare." And Dad: "Once. But nothing happened. Seemed kind of a waste. So I never did it again. Here's the secret, Gracie Belle. It's the emperor's new clothes. You don't _actually_ get high. So don't bother." And Mom and Matt and Julie, all laughing.)

Of course Gracie's not allowed to smoke pot or drink until she's eighteen, when it's legal, and she doesn't, and Mom's not at all worried she will, because none of her close friends do.

"So are you looking forward to seeing Paul tonight?" Mom asks. "Or are you going to play your little dating game again?"

"_What_ game?" Gracie doesn't mean to snap, but she does.

Mom sighs. "You know what I'm talking about. You love guns far more than guys."

Gracie picks up the dust cloth Mom left on the counter for her. "Well, I actually _am_ kind of looking forward to this date."

Mom leans the mop against the counter. "Really?" She sounds excited. Yeah! Gracie's finally doing something normal! "Well he's a very cute boy. And he _is_ polite. To me, anyway."

"That's because you don't demand he call you ma'am."

"I have a little more ability to make rapid cultural adjustments than your father."

Gracie chuckles and Mom's smile flashes out, like she's thrilled they've just shared a private joke at Dad's expense.

("Look," Julie told Gracie once, "Mom's just a little jealous of how close you and Dad are. She wants that with you. So cut her some slack." And Gracie: "It's not like I'm an annoying brat of a teenager." And Julie, voice growing high: "Did they tell you _I_ was?" And Gracie: "No. They've never told me that. I just mean I'm perfectly respectful to Mom." And Julie: "She doesn't want your respect. She wants your affection. And she wants you to want her advice.")

"So…." Gracie says. "Do you think I should let Paul kiss me tonight?" _There, Julie_, she thinks. _I'm asking for Mom's advice. Happy, now?_

Mom looks surprised. "You mean you didn't let him kiss you the _first_ time you went out?"

Gracie lets out an exasperated sigh and slides the cloth from the counter. Yeah, abnormal Gracie, who doesn't let a guy kiss her on the first date. "I think I better get this dusting done."

In the dining room, Gracie begins lightly sweeping the dust cloth along the hutch, which is artfully arranged with the china Mom inherited when grandma died.

("Why did I never meet grandma?" Gracie asked when they went to the funeral three years ago. "Because," Dad said, "she was batshit crazy." And Mom: "Eric! Do _not_ swear in front of your daughter!" And Julie: "Yeah, Dad. When did you become so profane?" And Matt: "Since you're already swearing, now might be a good time to tell you – Julie's pregnant.")

As Gracie works her way around the china, she spies it – the Billy Collins book. _Ballistics._ Sitting right there on the hutch. She left it there last week. No doubt Paul saw it, and…damn. Cory was right.

Suddenly she's livid. Before he asked her out, Gracie never spoke more than three words at a time to Paul. Obviously he only wanted to date her because she's pretty, and he just wants to get some bojang. Usually she goes into a date _knowing_ that, so there's no disappointment, but then Paul went and convinced her they had something in _common_, that he actually might _like_ her, and…damn him!

It was just a play all along. Right out of the player's playbook. And in an hour, he'll be here to pick her up and take her mini golfing. The bastard.


	7. Chapter 7

**Chapter Seven**

This time when Paul knocks on the door, Gracie's ready. She's running on the fumes of rage. Dad opens the door and is about to invite him in to the lair of interrogation when Gracie pushes straight past him, says, "Bye Dad," and lets herself into Paul's car, a gray, four-door Dodge Economy. (So called for the 60-miles a gallon its hybrid engine gets.)

Paul's worn a button-down shirt again, dark red this time, although he has khaki shorts on instead of pants. She hasn't bothered with a skirt. She's just thrown on light blue jeans and a dark green T-shirt with the white outline of a rifle under which is written _Pemberton Rifle_ and above which is written _Pioneers on the Range_. She thought it was a stupid slogan, but Coach Kim wanted to get "pioneer" in there somehow.

"What's your favorite Billy Collins poem?" Gracie demands the moment he starts driving. Paul would have to have actually _read_ the book to know that. If he just saw the volume lying on the hutch, he'd be caught.

"Uh…It's hard to say, really."

"That's what I thought."

"Maybe…'Divorce.' Because my parents got divorced two years ago. I saw the way they were when they went through the break up. So I _majorly_ get that poem. Or maybe 'Flames'." He laughs. "Smokey the Bear, burning down the forest, to show them how a professional does it. It makes me laugh. But it's also kind of…you know…you get tired of people not listening to you. I get that. Why, what's yours?"

"Uh…" Gracie adjusts her seatbelt across her chest. "I don't have a favorite. I have ones I _don't_ like, but the ones I _do_ like…I really like." She looks out the window and smiles a little, but then he smile wavers. "Why do you even want to date me? You hardly know me."

"Well, because….you're…you know. You're beautiful."

Of course.

"And because I'm kind of fascinated by the whole...uh…rfilery thing. I mean, I'm not at all interested in guns myself, but that you're good at it? I mean, that's got to take some balls to do a sport that's not that popular, you know, and that girls aren't expected to do."

She smirks and turns to look at him. "You really want to date a girl with balls?"

"Well…." He laughs. "Not literally. And, hey, once you _finally_ started talking to me, it was kind of fun Saturday night. Wasn't it?"

Gracie smiles. "Yeah. Yeah. It kind of was."

**/FNL/**

"Don't walk me to my door," she says when they're back in the driveway later that night.

"Isn't that, like, the gentlemanly thing to do?" Paul asks. He's been a gentleman all evening. Making conversation, listening to what she has to say, only trying to line up her put-put shot by putting his arms over her arms two or three times.

"Yeah, but, lately my Dad's taken to lingering in the foyer."

Paul laughs. "Is he trying to be intimidating? He doesn't want you dating me?"

"He hasn't forbidden it or anything."

"What if he did?"

She shrugs. "I can't see why he would. Mom's thrilled I'm dating. She wants more grandchildren, and my sister's said they're only having one child."

("That doesn't make any sense," Mom told Julie when she announced they were done with their family. "Kids need siblings to play with." And Julie: "Yeah, Gracie and I really enjoyed our chess matches when I was in high school." And Mom: "Well we at least TRIED to have more kids earlier." And Dad, smiling: "We tried very, very hard." And Matt: "Kids are just so expensive these days, and with all my traveling for the art shows…" And Julie: "There's always Gracie." And Mom, sighing, like she's sure Gracie's never going to _produce_ for her, not if she keeps up that gun thing.)

Gracie doesn't think anything of what she's just said until she sees Paul's face go white. "I mean, not anytime soon!" she hastens. "I mean, I just…I wasn't that interested in dating before I met…I mean…"

He smiles nervously. She leans in and kisses him, just to distract him. She doesn't expect it to be more than a peck, but his lips are so soft, and warm, and they feel surprisingly good against her own.

The truth is, she hasn't much enjoyed her past kisses, excepting those first two, seven-year-old experiments with O and Cory, which were exciting simply because of the new and clandestine nature of the kisses. They were out in the Harrises' backyard, Gracie on the swing, O on the swing next to her, Cory hanging upside down from his legs on the monkey bars, when Gracie suggested it. Cory said no way, but O dove right in and kissed her, and then Cory did too, because he couldn't let his brother be braver than him. But those were innocent explorations. There was absolutely nothing sexual in those childish kisses. It was supposed to feel different, better, now that she had passed through the terrible maze of puberty. But all of her kisses this past year since she began dating have disappointed her in some way – the guy's lips were too dry, or he tasted funny because of what he'd eaten earlier, or he opened his mouth too wide, or it was horribly awkward. She's never felt anything but a kind of uninspiring wetness, and she's always just wanted it to be over.

But Gracie doesn't want this kiss to be over.

She finds herself opening her mouth against Paul's, and their tongues are dancing. His lips are so full and warm. Why are they so full? She nibbles his bottom lip briefly before he presses his mouth hungrily against hers again. She can feel the heat spreading downward, and "Oh God," she moans and pulls abruptly away. She smacks the window with the back of her head, yelps, and puts a hand in her hair.

"I'm so sorry," Paul says. "Sorry, I thought…I mean…sorry." He puts his hand on the back of her head and rubs it gently. "Does it hurt bad?"

"No," she says. "I really have to go." She throws open the door of the car and just leaves it open when she gets out.

Paul leans across the passenger seat and says, "Next Saturday? 6:30?"

"I can't. Rifle State Championships. I'll be out of town."

He tries to ask her something else, but by now she's opening the front door.

Dad is not in the foyer, but he's awake when she comes in. He and Mom are sitting on the couch, cuddled up, waiting up. They're apparently making their way through the last season of _Downtown Abbey_, which is a show that went off the air when Gracie was thirteen.

("Dad does _not_ watch _Downtown Abbey_," Julie insisted when Gracie told her that their parents were viewing the old series. "Well," Matt said, "You know, sometimes a guy will give a little to get a little." And Gracie: "No, he actually likes it. I caught Dad watching it alone once when Mom was out of town for a conference." And Julie: "Not possible." And Matt: "Are you sure it wasn't just period porn? Because I'm sure that would have been a lot less embarrassing for him.")

An empty wine bottle and two half-filled glasses rest on the coffee table. Dad turns in the direction of the iWanderer and shouts, "Siri, shut off!" He still doesn't get that you don't have to yell at it. It's very technologically savvy. It's not deaf. The wall above the fireplace goes blank.

Mom sits up straight. "How was your date with Paul?"

Dad is eyeing Gracie intently.

"Okay," Gracie says. "Good," and then she doesn't sit down with them like she normally would. "I've got homework," she says, and clomps quickly up the stairs to her room.


	8. Chapter 8

**Chapter Eight**

With Coach Dan Harris driving and Coach Mary Kim taking shotgun, the Grant and Pemberton rifle teams wend their way to Crawford, an almost four-hour drive, for the State Championships. The two coaches have split the cost of the van rental, because niether school offers its support. These two teams will be competitors in a few hours, but right now as the sun rises over I-76 W and light glints through the windows, they're like one big family, talking trash about their competitors and boasting of how they're the two best rifle teams in all of Pennsylvania. There are nine kids – the top four qualifying shooters from each team along with Cory's twin O. Mom and Dad are going to meet Gracie there later; they're driving with Dan's wife Eden and another rifle team mom.

Cory, who is across the aisle from Gracie, leans over the back of his seat and says to O, "So why are you coming along? Writing an article for the _Gun Control Club Newsletter_?"

Gracie laughs as O rolls his eyes upward. "I'm here to support my brother. Of course. Besides," O says, "I don't want to outlaw rifle teams."

"Sure, just the rifles they use," says Tommy from beside Gracie. Tommy is lanky with a shock of black hair that contrasts boldly with his pale skin. He's the third best marksman on Pemberton's team, after Gracie and Sandra.

"No," O insists, "I just want to outlaw handguns. And maybe ownership of rifles and shotguns _if_ you're not registered as engaging in a qualified sport. You guys would still be able to compete."

Malcolm, a big, burly black guy who looks like he should be a linebacker rather than a marksman, but who is ranked second after Cory on Grant's team, says, "What about self-defense?"

O looks him up and down. "Yeah, I think you have other means, bloke."

Malcolm jerks his head toward Gracie. "What if I was attacking Gracie? What's she's supposed to do? Reason with me?"

"Well now," O says, "it would definitely be a challenge to reason with _you_. I'll give you that."

Gracie laughs. She doesn't mean to, but she does.

"Self-defense and deterrence are a legitimate use of handguns," Tommy says. "There's a lot less gay bashing when you don't know whether or not the gay guy's packing." Tommy is a proud member of the Pink Pistols. "And you don't only want me packing something as hugely uncomfortable as a rifle, do you?" He smiles lecherously. "Or do you, O?"

O rolls his eyes.

"Come on, O, man," Malcolm says. "Seriously. Do we brothers really only want guns in the hands of the police?"

"Bloke, I've never been attacked by the police_,_" O says. "Now street thugs with guns, on the other hand – "

"- You've been attacked by street thugs with guns?" Gracie asks in mock surprise. "You'd think I'd have heard that story by now."

"I mean, I'm _more likely_ to be attacked by street thugs with guns."

"And street thugs _always_ obey gun laws." Tommy is the master of the arrogant, dry tone.

"Besides," O says, "a gun is statistically more likely to be used against – "

"- Whoa – " Cory interrupts him. "You're going to try to tell me about statistics?"

"Yeaaaaah," Gracie says. "Might not want to fight the math genius with math. You might choose a better weapon. "

"Poetry, then," says O. "These violent delights have violent ends / And in their triumph die, like fire and powder / Which, as they kiss, consume."

"You have an awesome voice," says Sandra, who is sitting next to him. She puts a hand on O's shoulder. "You should do theatre."

O smiles but then resumes his offense. "You guys aren't even willing to make reasonable compromises. You even want to repeal the law limiting magazine capacity. I mean what is up with that? What do you need to be able to shoot a 10-round magazine for? Ten-round magazines only exist to kill."

"Unlike seven-round magazines," Gracie says, "which exist to make love."

Cory, Tommy, and Malcolm snort. Sandra suppresses a smile. The rest of the team members (Karen and Mike for Grant and Joey for Pemberton) are dozing off in the back seats of the van.

"O!" comes Dan's voice from the front of the van. "My dear son, you are sorely outnumbered here. I suggest you merely kick back and enjoy the ride."

O sighs. He looks at Gracie. "So how was your second date last Saturday with that Catholic bloke?"

Gracie blushes and looks at the floor of the van. "Okay." Paul arranged another date with her for next Saturday via text. In fact, they've been texting all week.

"Ah….!" Tommy says. "From the look of your face, girlfriend, it was _better_ than okay."

Sandra chuckles. Gracie's gossiped with her about Paul a bit. Sandra thinks he's adorable. Even before he asked Gracie out, Sandra commented on him every time she dropped Gracie off and he happened to be mowing the lawn. In fact, Gracie thinks, Sandra had a bit of a crush on him, but she also seems content to live vicariously through her.

"_Fine._ It was better than okay." Gracie, feeling her blush somewhat under control, raises her head. "And, Cory, you were completely wrong about him just guessing I liked Billy Collins and pretending he did. I asked him what specific poems he liked, and he named _two_, and he knew what they were _about_."

"And it's not at all possible that after your first date he had the sense to go look up some Billy Collins poems and read them," Cory says. "So he could prep for your second date."

Gracie grits her teeth.

"Thought didn't occur to you at all?" Cory asks.

"Why are you so down on Paul?" Gracie's voice is higher than she means it to be. "You don't even know him."

"I'm not _down_ on him. Just don't…just…be careful. I just want you to be careful."

"Use a rubber!" Tommy says in a high, dramatic voice of warning.

("In my day, we called them _condoms_," Julie said on the last family vacation, when a movie they were watching at the Atlantic City beach house used the other term. Then Matt, tentatively: "Well, I think a lot of people also called them rubbers." And Mom, turning to Dad: "Remember that sentence in that old grammar book we had in 9th grade? You know, those sentences we had to diagram?" And Dad, laughing: "Dick left his rubbers in his locker. DICK – ha ha – left his RUBBERS - ha ha - in his locker." And Gracie: "Why would they put that in a grammar book ? !" And Mom: "Rubbers used to mean, you know, those rubber rain boots you put on over your shoes." And Julie: "Dad's laughing. We're having a conversation about condoms, and he's laughing instead of freaking out." Then, looking at Matt, "Have I entered some kind of alternate universe?")

"Shhh!" Gracie cautions Tommy. She looks in the rearview mirror and sees Dan looking back in it, frowning. One Dad lingering in the foyer is enough. She doesn't need her godfather fretting over her too.

"That's not what I meant!" Cory insists. He lowers his voice. "I don't want her to get hurt. That's all."

"Chillax, bloke," Tommy says.

"Besides," Sandra says, "Paul's probably a sweet, religious guy. I mean, he goes to Catholic school, right, Gracie?"

"Well," Malcolm says, "half the blokes who go to Catholic school only go because they were troublemakers in public school. They got kicked out, or their parents sent them there hoping they'd get straightened out."

"That's not Paul," Sandra insists on Gracie's behalf.

"How do you know?" Cory asks.

"He wears a cross," Sandra says.

Tommy laughs sharply. "Yeah, no bad boy _ever_ wore a cross."

"Pemberton's going to beat Grant this year!" Gracie knows she's broken the silent understanding that the teams don't talk trash about each other on the ride down, that they present a united front, at least until the herd is thinned and they square off for first and second place. But she wants them to stop talking about Paul. "We're going to mop the floor with Grant."

Every team member who's awake looks at her and frowns.

**/FNL/ **

There are no playoffs for the State Championships anymore, because there are so few rifle teams left in Pennsylvania. All of the prior matches are simply tallied, and the top eight teams compete, which is to say, almost half of the teams in the state. Going into the State Championships, Pemberton is ranked second and Grant is ranked first.

The winning team in this competition is assured a spot in the National Championships, which is held in summer and is reserved for the top twenty high school teams in the country. Well, not exactly the _top_ twenty. There are geographical quotas, and each of the nine regions has to send at least one team. Because the Mid-Atlantic region includes only Pennsylvania, New York, and New Jersey, and the latter two states have outlawed competitive shooting among minors, the winner of the Pennsylvania State Rifle Championships always goes to Nationals. Grant High has been there two years running now.

Here at State, the spectators have to stand behind a clearly marked line and wear ear protection like the shooters. The coaches are here, but they're just here to watch, because in the State Championships, they aren't allowed to assist the shooters.

The State Championships are 3-Position Smallbore Rifle. The competitors will shoot in prone, standing, and kneeling positions. Gracie's best at prone and worst at standing, so she expects her score to go down and then up again, which it does.

When it's all over, Gracie doesn't walk away with the individual gold as she had hoped. Once again, she takes the silver. But Cory outscores her by only a single point this time. Sandra delivers a surprisingly good performance and earns herself the bronze, which means that, despite Cory's gold performance, Pemberton beats Grant.

Mom and Dad hug Gracie afterward. Dad says he's proud of her, but she expects that. It's when Mom says, "I'm so glad you're going to Nationals, baby. I can't wait to see you there," that Gracie feels really happy. She's always had the impression that Mom wishes her interests had taken a different turn, that Gracie were more conventional. Mom's never actually _said_ any of that, not outright, but it's how Gracie feels, so her words of encouragement are especially welcoming.

"Thanks, Mom," she says, smiling broadly. And then she starts making a practice calendar in her mind, marking off every opportunity to get to the range, because she's not walking away from Nationals without some kind of medal.


	9. Chapter 9

**Chapter Nine**

Before Paul shows up for the next date, Dad sits _Gracie _down in the dining room. He's never done this before. Gracie wonders if this is because it's the first time she's ever gone on a third date with a boy, or if maybe Dan talked to Dad about Tommy's "use a rubber" van shout-out.

Dad has a beer on the table, and the iWanderer is off. Mom, who these days is working on her Ph.D. in psychology, has deserted Gracie for an evening seminar.

"Listen to me, Gracie Belle," Dad says. "Teenage boys only want three things." He holds up a finger. "First – "

"- Did you and mom have sex before you were married?"

Dad's finger hovers in the air. He closes his mouth and lowers his hand to the table.

"How many times did you take Mom out before you had sex with her?" Gracie's watched him coach football for years. She knows how to pull a feint.

"Grace, that's not relevant to this conversation." He hardly ever calls her _**Grace**_, unless he's angry.

"Dad, I'm not having sex with Paul. At least not tonight. So you can chillax."

"You know I hate that word."

"Sex?"

"Chillax. I hate the word chillax."

She smirks. "Yeah. I know. That's why I use it."

He sighs. "I don't really know Paul. He doesn't go to Pemberton."

"Like you know every boy who goes to Pemberton?"

"No, but I can…" he trails off.

"Investigate them more easily? Julie was right. You _can_ be crazy about this stuff. You just didn't think I liked any of those other boys."

He shifts nervously in the dining room chair. "Do you _like_ Paul?"

She could deny it, but no one has ever made it to round three before, so Dad's got to know. "Yeah."

"Have you made out with him?"

She can't believe he's asked her that. "That's none of your business!"

"I'm your father." He says it like the blood relation automatically means everything is his business.

"So?"

"Gracie, this boy…I just want to make sure you – "

"- Oh come on, Dad! You trust me shoot a rifle but you don't trust me to be responsible with – "

" – It has nothing to do with responsibility, it has – "

"- I can't believe this!" Gracie's not used to this kind of relationship with her father.

"Can't believe what? You listen to me, Grace. You're only dating because your mother and I are giving you permission to date. We can revoke that permission at any time, and with this attitude – "

The doorbell rings. Gracie shoot outs of her seat and goes straight to the foyer. She's already gotten dressed, and, yes, she's wearing one of her most flattering outfits tonight, a one-piece spring dress. When she opens the door, Paul's holding a single red rose. "Thanks," she says as she grabs it. The thorns prick her hand where she's seized the stem, but she doesn't let that pain bother her. She yanks her purse from the coat rack and steps outside. Dad, of course, is at the door now.

"Good evening, Coach Tay– "

Paul's words are cut off as Gracie slams the door in her father's face, grabs Paul's hand, and tugs him toward his car.

"Hurry up," she tells him, and looking puzzled, he gets in the car and pushes the start button until it whirs to life.

Gracie shoves the rose in her purse, bending the stem in half in the process.

When he's headed down the street, Paul says, "Why the hurry? The movie doesn't start for twenty – "

"- Let's not go to the movies," Gracie interrupts. "Let's just go find some place to park and make out."

"Uh..." he laughs lightly, a little giddily, "Oh…ohkay. Sure. I know a place we can go."

A few minutes later, Paul pulls into an immense, empty parking lot and parks in a space at the far end, beneath the dark shadow of an overreaching tree. The sun is beginning to set, and a dim glow of light seeps into the Dodge Economy. Gracie looks the long expanse down to a set of stairs that leads up to what appears to be a steepled building. "Is this your church?" she asks. "Don't Catholics have mass on Saturday nights?"

"They used to have a Saturday night mass, but only like fifty people came, so they switched it to Saturday morning instead. No one will be here tonight."

"Why do you guys have such huge parking lots?"

"Well," he says, smiling, "we're not like you Protestants, you know, splitting up and starting a new church over every little thing." She's not smiling, but not because she's offended. She's still ticked off at Dad. "Hey," he says softly, "I was just jok – "

"- Shut up." Gracie kisses him. The kiss deepens and she slides over and straddles him right there in the driver's seat.

"Wow," he says between kisses. "You're really….wow."

She realizes suddenly that it's stupid to make out with a boy because you're pissed off at your dad, but she soon forgets because Paul's lips trail to a particularly sensitive spot on her earlobe. "You're amazing, Gracie," he murmurs. "You're so…unpredictable." His lips reach the base of her neck, and a shiver runs through her whole body. She moans and arches backwards, and the horn blares.

They both laugh and look back and forth out the windows up and down the length of the parking lot.

"You want to go to the backseat?" she asks. "I mean, just so we don't lean on the horn?" She's not sure that's the wisest idea, but she wants the heat of his lips back on her flesh, and she scrambles between the two front seats into the back.

He follows smiling. His eyes are like the Caribbean ocean in the reflection of the dim light that feathers its way across the backseat. Soon his lips are exactly where she wants them. One of his hands slides from her back to her front. He begins to caress a breast through the fabric of her dress as he kisses her. It's the first time a boy has ever touched her like that, and she had no idea it would feel so good. She pushes him down against the seat. His knees are bent and his feet on the floor when Gracie straddles him, her dress ruffled and pushed slightly up, her lips capturing his in tiny gasps as she presses instinctively against him.

"Oh, Gracie," he moans. "Oh, God…we better slow down."

She swallows and catches her breath. "What?"

_**She's**_ supposed to make that call. Not _**him**_.

He sits up and slides her off his lap. "If we don't slow down, we might…go too far."

She straightens her dress, stretching it back to just above her knees. There is no _too far_ for boys, is there? She thought too far was only for girls.

"You know I'm religious," he says.

"Uh…no. I didn't actually."

"I go to Catholic school," he says. He pulls his cross out from underneath his collar. "I always wear this."

"Yeah, but lots of guys go to Catholic school just because they get kicked out of public school."

"Oh." He puts an elbow on his knee and digs a hand into his wavy blonde hair. His fingers slide back and to the curls by his neck. "Is that why you agreed to date me? You like bad boys?"

"No! I mean…no….I just. No. I don't really."

He raises his head and searches her eyes. "I'm really attracted to you," he says. And then he smiles. "I mean, who wouldn't be, right? But I don't go to Catholic school because I got in trouble. I asked my mom to send me. I'm really interested in the Bible and stuff."

"You are?" He didn't mention it on their first or second date. Of course, he was asking her questions about herself most of that time. She didn't ask him much about himself. She wants to kick herself now for being so self-centered.

"Yeah. When I get out of college, I want to be a lay teacher at a Catholic high school. I want to teach Apologetics and Church History."

"Oh."

"Anyway, premarital sex is kind of against my religion. And I take my religion seriously. I'm okay with making out, as long as we stop before it gets too far. I understand if you don't want to date me. But that's my belief."

"Why would that make me not want to date you?"

"Well, because, I thought you wanted – "

"-I'm not some _slut_." She sounds too defensive, even to her own ears.

"I didn't say you were. I don't think that."

"But you thought I was going to go all the way on the third date?"

"No. I just didn't - "

"- Just so you know, I'm a virgin too. And I plan to wait until I'm married too. Or at least until I'm twenty."

He looks out the window, and then he looks back. "Twenty?"

"Okay, it's arbitrary, I know. But that's what I've decided."

He smiles. "Yeah, like I said, you're not easy to predict." He laughs. "You want get out of this parking lot? We don't have to do the movies, but…what do you want to do?"

She smiles mischievously. "Let's sneak onto the Pemberton football field and get sugar high on Red Power and throw empty cans at the scoreboard."

(She did it with Cory once, when they were thirteen, after Cory told Dad he wasn't playing football anymore, and Dad said some things maybe he shouldn't have. Cory got a little pissed off, and they rode their bikes there. Dad found them an hour later in the field. They both thought he was going to rip into them for throwing cans at his scoreboard, but instead he just told Cory he was sorry for what he'd said, that Cory was an excellent marksman, and that riflery _was_ a legitimate sport after all. Then he told them to collect the cans while he tossed their bikes in his pick-up.)

Paul laughs, a gentle happy laugh. "Unpredictable."

"It's more fun than it sounds."

"What if your dad finds out?"

"He'll be glad you're banging his scoreboard and not his daughter."


	10. Chapter 10

**Chapter Ten**

Gracie and Paul make a game of the can tossing – who can get closest to the "V" in visitor? Later, they end up sitting on the sidelines, talking, and kissing on and off. They lose track of time, and when Paul glances at his watch and sees it's twenty minutes past when he's supposed to have her home, he gulps and stands and tells her to hurry.

"Don't worry. My dad won't _actually_ kill you. And you don't have to walk me to the door tonight. I'll spare you."

On the drive home, he asks her, "So, this Cory guy you've mentioned a few times…do you and he…is there a thing there?"

"A _thing_?" she asks. "With _Cory_?" She laughs. "I guess, if family is a thing. He's like a brother to me."

Paul's blue eyes are pools of doubt. "Yeah?"

"Yeah."

"So he's not…good-looking, right?"

She smiles and kisses his cheek. "Not as good-looking as you. Well," she moves her head away, "I guess he is, objectively speaking, but I'm not attracted to him like I am to you."

Paul holds the wheel with one hand and scratches his forehead with the other as he asks his next question. "Are you…uh….dating anyone else at the moment?"

She looks in the backseat. "No, not at the moment. Not that I can see."

He chuckles. "I mean…you know what I mean."

"Why do you ask?"

He's gripping the steering wheel with both hands now. "Because I don't want you to. I want to be select."

("We said exclusive," Julie told her once. "An exclusive relationship. Select sounds so…odd." And Matt: "Yeah, it makes it sound like you're picking your girlfriend from a vending machine." And Mom: "We said going steady, didn't we, hon?" And Dad: "Well _I_ said going steady. You apparently _heard_ something else." And Mom: "Oh, Eric, we were _not_ going steady until we got engaged. I made that perfectly clear to you from the beginning. And you know what, sugar? You benefited from all that test driving, I can assure you, because I walked into this marriage well aware that the grass is not greener on the other side." )

"Oh." Gracie looks out the window. She doesn't want to date anyone else, so that's not a problem, but she's still a little afraid of her own feelings for Paul. She's never experienced this sort of thing before. Select is serious. Select makes it _real_ somehow. "Ummm…."

He swallows. "Nevermind."

"No, I….yeah. Yes. That's…select." She smiles, happy and embarassed all at once, and he reflects her grin in the full lines of his own lips.

**/FNL/**

When Gracie gets in, Mom's car is in the driveway, but Dad's sitting alone in the living room. There's only one lamp on, and he's staring at the unlit fireplace. He turns his head and just looks at her.

"So are you going to forbid me to date him now?" she asks.

"Your mother has informed me that would be counterproductive. And the evidence seems to indicate she's right. As usual." He reaches over to the end table and grabs hold of his beer bottle. He continues to look at her as he brings it to his lips.

She's not sure what he's waiting for. Does he expect her to say she's sorry for running out? Because she's not. _He's_ the one who should apologize. But he doesn't. He just sits there staring at her. "I'm going to bed," she says, and in an instant, her feet are on the stairs.

**/FNL/**

The next morning, when the Taylors get home from church, Gracie expects Dad to change into jeans and T-shirt, turn on the iWanderer, and adhere himself to his recliner. But instead, he says, "Hey, peanut, you want to go down to the basement and do some dry firing with me?"

She knows what this means. If it were Julie, he'd invite her to play ping pong. But Gracie isn't Julie. She sighs. She doesn't want a lecture about Paul, especially since she still feels a little embarrassed by the way she threw herself at him last night. "Okay, but only if I can use your handgun."

They both change into their Sunday relaxation clothes and meet downstairs. It's ten degrees cooler in the basement, which is nice, because even though it's May, Dad hasn't turned on the air conditioning yet. They have to dig around the basement shelving for a while before they find the snap caps. They aim toward the target Matt painted on the one unfinished, brick wall of the basement the last time he and Julie visited. It's a traditional series of circles, but each one is uniquely patterned, and in the bulls eye is a yellow-green, monster-like eye. Five minutes into the dry firing, Dad says, "Sorry if I upset you last night. I just don't want you to get hurt."

Relief washes over Gracie. She hates there being any tension between them, but she couldn't have said she was sorry first. "I know." Gracie racks the chamber open, locks it in place, and lays the gun on the ping pong table.

He goes and sits on the old couch they've left down there and pats the cushion next to himself. She follows. "You're my last baby. And you're growing up."

She smiles at him sympathetically.

"You're a smart girl, Gracie. I should trust you won't do anything stupid."

Gracie doesn't comment, because she didn't precisely start out the evening being smart.

"It's just…" Dad runs a hand through his hair. "Boys can put a lot of pressure – "

" – Look, _I_ wanted to do it with Paul last night, but _he_ said no." Gracie's not sure that's entirely honest. She did _want_ to do it, but she doesn't think she actually _would_ have, even if he had wanted to. She hopes she wouldn't have. She's too young, and they haven't dated long enough, and she has her arbitrary goal, after all.

Dad's stunned. Julie was probably never this direct with him. Finally, he just says, "Really?"

Gracie nods.

"That kid's strange. I mean, I thought it was strange his school didn't even have a football team, but…wait," his voice suddenly high, "_you_ wanted to?"

"I _wanted_ to. It doesn't mean I _would_ have. If it's any reassurance, Dad, I've decided to wait until I'm married, or until I'm at least twenty."

He nods. "Makes sense. You'll be a junior in college by then."

"Thank you! Everyone else thinks it's arbitrary!"

"Nah. Very reasonable. And more to the point – it's four years away."

She laughs. "So are we cool again?"

"I didn't think we were ever uncool."

"Well," she says, "_I_ was never uncool."

"Yeah, you're old man's too old to be cool. I'm going to be sixty before long."

"Yeah, in about a _decade_."

He sighs. "_Less_ than a decade."

"Dad, are you having a midlife crisis?"

He raises his hand and holds two fingers an inch a part, as if to say, a little bit. "So is your mother, I think."

"Thus the psychology Ph.D.?"

He nods.

"What does she plan to _do_ with that?"

"God only knows. But she feels like she's missing something. She loves counseling those kids at Pemberton. But she's been doing it for _over_ a decade now. Like I've been coaching the Pioneers. I've _never_ coached a single team this long."

"Do you regret not taking that job in Alabama?"

"Nah. There are more important things than football. Like you, and your mother, and our family. I don't regret putting y'all first. And your mother doesn't regret giving up that headmaster job either. It was what we all needed at the time. But you'll be in college in less than two years, Gracie."

"I'll still come home on breaks, you know."

"I know," he says, but he sounds sad, so she lays her head on his shoulder and sits with him awhile longer


	11. Chapter 11

**Author's Note:** I suspect interest in this story may be waning based on the zero reviews for the last chapter, but as I have already drafted it out and need only to edit each chapter, and because this is actually my favorite of all the FNL fan fiction I've written to date (despite the fact that it doesn't focus on my favorite couple), I'm going to see it through to completion regardless of interest level. LOL. Maybe by the time I'm done I'll have an idea for another story, because right now there is nothing on the back burner.

**Chapter Eleven**

"Can we talk about something other than Paul?" Cory asks. They're taking a break from target shooting at Dan's range and are relaxing in the predictable space. "Like the National Championships? Which are just around the corner?" He lets his right leg fall against the side of the flat rock to the ground and bends over to the cooler.

School has been out for a month, and the championships are next week, the last Thursday in July, in Atlanta. It's going to be scalding hot, but since half the competitors are from the deep south, that's where they chose to have it. They used to have Nationals in spring, but three years ago they shifted the schedule to prevent competitors from having to take off school for travel. Some of the schools weren't very supportive.

Now that it's summer, Gracie and Paul have been seeing each other frequently, when he isn't doing landscaping and she isn't preparing for Nationals either at the indoor range with the Pemberton Rifle team or at Dan's range with Cory. Between their frequent dates, Gracie and Paul have been texting and calling each other. She loves making out with him - a perfectly safe, pressure-free, but thrilling tangle of kisses and caresses. She loves the way he treats her - with tenderness and respect and all his attention tuned to her.

"He goes to mass every morning," Gracie says. "But he's not a religious freak or anything. He's just really spiritual. He's majorly down to earth."

"Gracie, seriously, you've got to improve your standing position." Cory's pop can hisses open. "If you want to have a chance of getting a medal at Nationals, you need to get this bloke out of your mind for a little while."

"Paul thinks it's cool that I can shoot even though he doesn't really like guns. I mean, he wouldn't ever start a gun control _club_ like O, but he _is_ majorly anti-war and against the death penalty and – "

Cory shushes her because Dan is approaching the rock.

"So, Gracie," her godfather announces when he arrives and puts one foot up on the rock, leaning his elbow on his knee. "Don't you think it's time to pop Paul's cherry?"

"_What?_" Gracie and Cory say together, Cory not only astonished, but also apparently angry.

Dan laughs. "I mean…the boy's never shot a gun. Don't think you should invite him to the range sometime this week?"

"You just want to meet him," Gracie tells her godfather. "Check him out."

"I can neither confirm nor deny that accusation." Dan takes his foot down. "Bring the blonde Catholic cherub to me," he says. "And I'll let you know if he passes muster."

Gracie turns to Cory. "As if one Dad wasn't enough."

**/FNL/ **

Paul gets chewed out by Dan in his first ten minutes at the range. Dan is about the most laid back man Gracie has ever met, but break one of his range safety rules – even accidentally – and he becomes like Dad on the football field. He doesn't make Paul run bleachers, but he yells. And then he yells some more. Gracie feels awful for her boyfriend.

When Dan's done yelling, and Cory's still snickering, Gracie takes off her ears and says, "It's okay, Paul. It's a common rookie mistake. We _all_ did it our first time out."

"Not you," Cory says, who's also shed his ears.

"No," Gracie retorts, "But _you_ did. And O. And my dad."

"Okay, young man," Dan says. "I don't mean to be rough on you but – well I do mean to be rough on you. Do that again and you're off my range. Am I understood?"

Paul nods. It's clear he doesn't want to be here. He wants to be done with this, but he's suffering through it for her. And suffer through he does. But by the end of the hour, when he's actually managed to get _on_ the target, he finally seems to be having a bit of fun.

"Thanks," Gracie tells him on the car ride home later. "I know that wasn't easy for you. I appreciate you seeing what I do, you know? And trying."

Paul lowers his hand from the steering wheel and puts it on her knee. "It wasn't so bad. Once I started to get the hang of it. I'm just…you know…" He shrugs. "I'm a pacifist you know."

She smiles and leans her head against the window. "I know. You're sweet." He's gotten into a small, Catholic liberal arts college in northern Massachusetts. He'll be leaving at the end of August, and he'll be over six hours away. He's promised to call and e-mail and text regularly and even come home every other weekend. But it won't be enough. She swallows. "Paul?"

"Yeah?" He squeezes her knee.

"I think I love you."

He smiles. "I think I love you too. And I'm pretty smart. So what I think is usually true."

She kisses him. "I don't want you to go," she whispers in his ear. Then she pulls away because he's trying to drive. "I wish you could go to college someplace closer."

"I wish I could too. But they have a majorly good apologetics and history program at this school. " He slides his hand off her knee and puts it on the wheel. "Listen," he says. "I've been thinking. I'm _really_ gonna miss you." He bites his bottom lip. "And I wondered if maybe – and I completely understand if the answer is no and if it is it won't change anything between us – but I was wondering if maybe we shouldn't be so…old fashioned. You know?"

"You mean…you want us to have sex before you go off to college?"

He studies the road in front of him. "If you want to. _Only_ if you want to. No pressure at all. Just, letting you know…that my conscience is okay with it."

"How do you figure that? Doesn't the Bible prohibit fornication?"

"Yeah, but there's some debate as to how to _define_ fornication. The Greek - "

"- Is this what you meant earlier when you were talking about interpretative gymnastics?"

"Don't make – "

"- I'm _not_ making fun. I know you're serious about this religion thing, Paul. I respect that. That's why I'm surprised. Are you _sure_ you want to?"

He glances at her. "I really want you, Gracie. I think about you all the time. Honest to God, I'm not sure I even care if it's a sin. I just really want you. I'm sorry."

"Don't be _sorry_ about it." She puts a hand on his leg, near his thigh. "I'll think about it. I'll think about it while I'm away at Nationals."


	12. Chapter 12

**Chapter Twelve**

Gracie's godfather has been coaching her on and off all afternoon. Now that Grant High is out of the running, he figures it's okay to help the opposition. After all, Pemberton is representing all of Pennsylvania – indeed, all of the MidAtlantic.

Gracie drops a shot all the way down into the fourth ring and curses herself.

"You're just getting tired," Dan tells her. "Take a break. I've got to sight in a couple rifles I put together for some customers anyway."

She and Cory, who's been helping her too, make their way to the rock and dig in to the cooler.

"_Diet_ Red Power?" Gracie asks. "When did that happen?"

He holds the can in one hand and reaches down and pinches his gut with the other. "I've got to watch my girlish figure, you know."

She laughs. "What are you talking about? You're in great shape."

"Not as good as I used to be. I haven't been playing football regularly for three years. So I gain a lot faster now." He raises the Diet Red Power to his lips.

"So I'm thinking of doing it with Paul."

Cory chokes and sprays the pop onto the dusty ground where the grass hasn't grown in the shadow of the rock. He coughs and then says, "I thought you were waiting until you're twenty."

Gracie shrugs. "I might change my mind. With him leaving and all. I told him I'd let him know after Nationals."

"Bad idea," Cory says.

"Why? I'll be seventeen in a week. It'll be perfectly _legal_ you know. "

"I didn't mean from a legislative perspective, genius." He slides his finger up the side of the can. "Gracie, he's going off to college. College is a time when…a lot of guys…move on. What if you two don't work out? You're going to regret it. Some other girl might not, but you…I _know_ you. I know you're going to regret it."

"We're not breaking up. He's coming home every other weekend!"

"Yeah, but why don't you wait until…at least until, you know, winter break after the next semester. Make sure you're still together?"

"Geez. I expected this from Julie." Which is why she hasn't yet called to ask her sister's opinion on the subject. "I didn't expect it from you. Then again, maybe I should have. You're family too."

"I'm not family," Cory says.

"Sure you are. I think of you like a brother. Don't you think of me as a sister?"

"No, Gracie. Definitely not."

Gracie's hurt. She's closer to Cory than she is to anyone, probably. How could he not think of her as family?

In the distance a red, four-door pick-up truck approaches. It's O. He dropped them at the range this morning because he wanted the vehicle, and now he's back an hour before he was supposed to be. He'll have to hang with them. Dan calls Cory to the range, and he heads in that direction, while Gracie goes to greet O.

O hasn't given up on his Gun Control Club, though he's no longer dating the gun control chick. He's dating Gracie's friend Sandra instead. They really hit it off on the van ride home from State. ("Guess he didn't start the club for a girl after all," Gracie told Cory. "Guess he actually believes in it." And Cory: "It's also a turn on for him to fight with Sandra over it.")

As O steps down from the truck, he says, "Hey, Gracie girl. Ready to kick some ass at Nationals?"

She perches herself on the hood of the pickup. "Like you care. You think I delight in violence."

He lifts himself up by his arms next to her. "You know that's not true."

"Cory thinks I shouldn't have sex with Paul. We were going to wait. But now we think…maybe not. I really want to. But _Cory_ thinks it would be stupid of me."

"Well, you've been dating Paul a few months. You spend a lot of time together. You're about to turn seventeen. And he seems to love you."

Gracie knows O and Sandra did it for the first time two weeks ago, when Sandra's parents were out of town. She heard all about it from Sandra. "Yeah, but Cory thinks I shouldn't – "

"- Well _of course_ Cory would say that."

"Why?"

O chuckles and shakes his head.

"What's so funny?"

From the range, Dan hollers at her to come back.

**/FNL/**

Mom decides they should drive to Nationals, and even though it's only thirteen hours to Atlanta, she plans for them to take two days there and two days back so that they can see some sites along the way. "Family road trip!" Mom exclaims, and Dad's bushy eyebrow rears itself in skepticism.

All Gracie can think is that she won't see Paul for six whole days, and when she gets back, they'll have only three more weeks left together, and he'll expect an answer, yes or no, about the sex.

Gracie and Dad fight over whether to listen to sports radio or music on the drive, and Mom legislates a compromise. They will each get one hour, and Mom will get the third—which means the radio goes off and they _all_ have to _talk_.

At the three hours mark, Mom clicks sports radio off right in the middle of the announcer's sentence. "Hey!" Dad says.

"It's my turn."

Dad clenches his jaw but doesn't reply.

Mom takes off her sunglasses and chews on one end. Then she puts them back on and says, "I want to be a professor."

Dad, who's driving, glances in the rearview mirror at Gracie in the backseat. He left his sunglasses in the bathroom of the last gas station, so she can see his pleading eyes.

"Well, what do y'all say? I think I want to be a professor!"

Dad's eyes seek Gracie's in the rear view mirror again. _I'm not touching that one with a ten-foot pole_, her eyes tell him.

"Eric?"

"That sounds…interesting."

"Interesting? _Interesting?_"

"Well," he says, "I kind of thought you were getting that Ph.D. because you wanted to be a counselor."

"I'm already a counselor."

"I mean a real counselor."

_Oh, Dad,_ Gracie's eyes say to his in the rearview mirror. _Oh, Dad. Oh, poor, foolish father. _ His eyes, which are growing wide, tell her that he realized his mistake almost the moment the words fell from his mouth.

Mom's hair shakes. "A _real_ counselor?"

"I mean," Dad hastens, "I thought maybe you wanted your own practice!"

"Well I don't, _Eric_!" Mom spits the _Eric_ out as if she's hurling the word several feet to some distant sidewalk on the other side of the highway. "I want to be a professor."

"Okay."

"Okay?" she asks. "Okay? What do you think of the idea?"

"Uh…well…a psychology professor?"

"No, Eric, I was thinking of teaching Macroeconomics or maybe Physics."

Dad is searching the rearview mirror for salvation, but Gracie gives him only sympathy and a shrug.

"Okay," Dad says again.

"_Well_, do you think I'd be able to get a position? I mean, I'll be just a few years from sixty by the time I finally finish my dissertation. And Eden was only thirty when she started, and she still had a hard time finding employment before she finally got tenure, and she had to change schools three times, so…do you think it might be difficult for me?"

Dad and Gracie are communicating silently in the rearview mirror again. Dad is saying, "Didn't she just answer her own question?" and Gracie is saying, "Watch your step. Careful Dad, careful."

"Uh…." Dad says. "It's kind of a tight job market, Tami."

"Thanks for your support."

Gracie chuckles.

"Well, what do _you_ think, Gracie?" Mom asks.

"Uh…." Gracie looks out the window. She needs to pull a feint, and fast. "I'm thinking of having sex with Paul, but I haven't decided yet."

Dad slams on the brakes, Mom yelps, and the car jerks back into motion when Dad realizes he's in the middle of the highway and there's no one in front of him. There's deathly silence in the car for three minutes until Dad pulls onto an exit ramp and then just parks in the shoulder. He turns off the engine and sits there with his hand on the keys, not pulling them out, starring ahead at the high grass that stretches out before them.

Gracie guesses Julie didn't talk to them about this sort of thing. But they've always insisted she could talk to them about _anything_, _anytime_.

A minute ago, Gracie thought anything would be better than answering Mom's question. Now she's not so sure.


	13. Chapter 13

**Chapter Thirteen**

Gracie sits rigidly in the back seat of the car. A pickup shudders past them on the exit ramp. It's okay, she reassures herself. Mom will come to her rescue. Mom will calm down Dad, who is at this moment gripping the keys extra hard, his knuckles growing white.

Mom will be the voice of measured reason. She'll tell Dad that Gracie is a responsible young lady who is capable of making her own personal decisions on a wide range of subjects, and that psychological research shows that parents need not be overanxious about the natural, healthful development of their teenage children, and that –

"Are you out of your mind!" Mom's hair bobs in the front seat. She whirls around. "You are just about to turn seventeen years old!"

"Tami," Dad says.

"You can't even vote!"

"Tami – "

"- You've dated this boy for less than four months."

"Tami – "

"- Less than four months!"

"Tami – "

"- You are not going to have sex with that boy. You are absolutely – "

"- **Tami!**"

Mom closes her mouth, swallows, turns, and stares out the window.

"Let's – " Dad lets go of the keys and puts his hand on her shoulder. "Let's just all take a deep breath here and calm down."

Mom does take a deep breath. Then she exhales, slow and long. Then inhales, then exhales. She does it again. "Yes," she says finally. "Let's have a calm, rational discussion about this. When we get to the hotel."

Dad starts the car. He turns on sports radio. No one objects. It's a very long remaining three hours to the hotel. No one says anything the entire drive. They were planning to visit at a museum as soon as they got to Harrisonburg (their midpoint stop), but they don't. They just drive straight to the hotel, so the room is not quite ready yet. That leads to more awkward standing around, until finally they've brought in their suitcases and Gracie's rifle and Dad's turned down the comforter and taken off his watch and is sitting on the edge of one of the queen beds.

Mom sits next to him and pats the queen bed across from her. Obediently, Gracie sits down and braces herself for the lecture that is sure to follow.

"Do you feel ready to have sex with Paul?" Mom asks, in the calm voice Gracie had expected from her to begin with.

Dad swallows and looks off into the corner, where the closed curtain is billowing up slightly from the fan.

"Dad," Gracie says, "Maybe you should go down to the lobby and watch ESPN."

He doesn't even make a pretense of protest. He jumps up and grabs his key card and the door latches loudly behind him.

Gracie and Mom talk. At the end of the discussion, Mom calls and makes Gracie an appointment for the gynecologist for the very day they get back. She reminds Gracie that it takes a while for the pill to take effect, and that if she _does_ choose to have sex with Paul, she needs to use a condom for backup for a while. "I do wish you would wait until you've dated him longer, but it's ultimately your decision, and I'm glad you came to us, honey. I'm glad you can be open with us."

"Well you didn't make it easy at first."

"I know."

"Are you going to tell Dad I'm going on the pill?"

"Gracie, I probably wouldn't if you hadn't already let the cat out of the bag. But at this point, it'll probably be more relief to him to know you're on it."

Gracie nods. "Okay," she says quietly.

Mom covers her hand with her own and squeezes. "Paul's a good boy," she says. "And I'm sure given that he's going off to college, he wants to be as close to you as he can. But this is _your_ decision. Not _his_. It's _your_ body."

"I know that, Mom."

"I just want to make sure you do. If you're afraid of losing him when he goes away to college, don't assume this is a way to hold on."

"I'm not afraid of losing him," she lies. "He's coming home every other weekend."

"Okay, sweetie." Mom sighs. Her hand slides away from Gracie's. "Let's go round up your Dad and go to that firearms museum y'all wanted to see. It closes in two hours."

**/FNL/**

When they're looking into the third to last glass case full of rifles, Mom disappears to the museum cafe, where she'll probably read some psychology book on her iPhone. This stuff bores her. After the first hour, it probably bores Dad, too, but Gracie's not quite done reading everything, and Dad lingers by her side. He crosses his arms over his chest. "Gracie," he says, "please don't do this."

She closes her eyes. "How old was _Julie_?"

"What does that matter? This isn't a competition."

"But you still love her."

"Gracie…"

Her eyes are still closed but she feels his strong arms surround her. "I'll always love you."

"I _know_ that, Dad." She opens her eyes and pulls away to face him. "That's my point. This isn't going to change anything. I mean, _if_ I decide to. I'll still be your daughter." Mom told her to go easy on Dad, that she couldn't know what it was like to be a father in this position.

Dad rubs his brow. "Gracie, it's not…that." He lowers his hand. "It's just that I don't think Paul is the one."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean, Paul's a decent young man. I can see he treats you well. But I really don't think he's the guy you're going to end up with when it's all said and done. And I think you're going to regret it. I _know_ you, and I think you're going to regret it."

"God, you sound like Cory."

"Cory's a smart kid. He's a good kid. Cory cares about you."

"So does Paul."

"Yeah. But he's not the one."

Gracie shakes her head and looks into the case. "I don't want to talk about this anymore."

"Okay," he says, and turns and begins commenting on one of the historical rifles.


	14. Chapter 14

**Chapter Fourteen**

They check out of their Harrisonburg hotel the next morning, and it's a relatively uneventful drive the rest of the way to Atlanta. Dad tunes the radio to Gracie's favorite music station and doesn't change it. He and Mom chat on and off in the front seat, about Matt's latest art show, about whether Julie will ever change her mind and produce them a second grandchild, and about some woman named Tyra who's marrying some man named Tim in Texas this August, and how they can't go to the wedding because it's during the summer football camp Dad already committed to coaching.

"I just never thought she'd settle for him," Mom says.

"Tim's an a'ight guy. I mean, it's not like Tyra is Little Miss Sunshine."

"I know, but she grew so much in college and law school, and she never wanted to get trapped in Dillon."

"She's not _trapped_," Dad says. "She's the deputy mayor! And Tim's doing pretty well for himself. He's got that rent-a-husband business – "

"- Handyman business, Eric."

"- Plus the second job at Buddy's. He makes decent money, and he's got the land."

"He's still an alcoholic."

"Yeah, but he's a _functional_ alcoholic. Look, Tami, Tyra and Tim are a lot alike, when you get right down to it."

"I guess I always hoped she'd end up back together with Landry. That boy was so good to her."

"Well nice guys finish last, don't they?"

"Oh, sugar," she leans over and kisses him on the cheek, "you finished pretty well, didn't you?"

"I made a showing," he says, smirking. "I made a respectable showing."

Mom laughs and slaps his knee. "Speaking of Landry, Matt told me this record producing job of his is really taking off. Apparently he worked on some big album, some album by some guy named Jerry Waxworth or something."

"Geronimo Waxford?" Gracie asks from the back seat.

"What the hell kind of name is that?" Dad asks.

Mom turns around. "Yeah, you heard of him?"

"Of course I've heard of him. You _know_ his producer? Does Julie know him?"

"Yeah, he and Matt and Julie were all good friends in high school. They still keep in touch and see each other every now and then." Mom sits forward again. "Glenn told me Becky finally got married. She grieved for Luke for a long time when he didn't come back from Iraq. I'm glad she's finally managed to find happiness. But you'll never believe who she's marrying."

"I'd guess Tim Riggins if he wasn't marrying Tyra."

"J.D. McCoy."

Dad's sunglasses go up slightly as he widens his eyes.

"After he washed out of the NFL and moved back to Dillon and started buying up half the town, I thought he was going to continue Joe's bad legacy and politics. But he's surprised me. That free clinic he started, and the football camp for troubled kids? I'm glad he got out from under the shadow of his father. It's surprising where these kids end up."

Dad nods. "Yeah, like Smash. Making movies. He always did love the attention."

"Smash?" Gracie asks. "Smash Williams? Like, the guy who does the comedies? You _know_ him?"

"Your dad coached him," Mom says. "Back on the Panthers. In Dillon. Before TMU. Before the Lions. Before the Pioneers."

"Holy…wow. Are you still in touch with him?"

"Nah," Dad says. "I haven't heard from him since he moved to L.A. eight years ago."

"Of course Lyla and Jason are the biggest surprise." Mom shakes her head.

"Sometimes things come full circle."

"Still, I feel a little bad for his ex-wife," Mom says.

"Why? She cheated on him."

Mom whips off her sunglasses. "She did?"

"Yeah. That's why he divorced her. He ran into Lyla after that, when he went to see that client in Tennessee."

"Oh." Mom puts her sunglasses back on. "I never got the full story. You only gave me a rough outline after Buddy called. How is Buddy anyway?"

"A'ight. Buddy, Jr. started his own business. Designing video games. He's still in the basement, but Buddy says he's finally making money."

Gracie thinks it might be fun to run her own business one day. She wouldn't design video games of course. Maybe she'd become a gunsmith, like Dan.

"And Buddy opened that second bar," Dad continues.

Their conversation recedes to a murmur as Gracie begins exchanging texts with Paul. He's not asked for her answer yet, but he keeps sending her little notes like "Luv u" and "You're beautiful" and "Knock 'em dead. Oh. Is that bad to say for a rifle match?" and "I can't get you out of my mind."

**/FNL/**

They're standing at the front desk of their Atlanta hotel and Dad is asking where they can get some good barbecue when a jovial voice arises from behind them, "Gracie Taylor's fan club has arrived."

Gracie turns to see her godfather, sunglasses pushed up on his wispy brown hair and a huge smile on his face. Next to him stands Cory, a backpack slung over his left shoulder.

"Dan!" she says, and runs into his outstretched arms.

"Nationals. I'm so proud of you, young lady."

"A regular Annie Oakely," Cory says.

Gracie pulls back from Dan's embrace and looks at Cory, who's smirking. "Is O and your mom here too?"

"Nah," Cory says. "O's got training for soccer and Mom has to lecture."

"But we wouldn't miss it for the world," Dan says. "We flew in this morning and rented a car. What do you say we all go partake of some nourishment together?"

By now Dad's got his recommendation for a good barbecue place, and he comes over and shakes Dan's hand and slaps Cory on the shoulder.

"Tami," Dan says, nodding to Gracie's approaching mother, "Lovely as always." She smiles. "Did Eric pick a place that has decent wine?"

"I wouldn't count on that," Mom replies.

Dan makes a tsking sound. "Think of your wife, Coach. And me. Now that I'm on this low carb diet I can't drink beer."

"Wine has carbs," Cory says.

"Not as many," Dan insists.

Cory shakes his head. "I think those M&M's you were chowing down on during the plane ride had a carb or two."

"They were _dark_ chocolate M&M's," Dan says. "They hardly count."

The Taylors wait for Dan and Cory to check in before heading to the restaurant.


	15. Chapter 15

**Chapter Fifteen**

Atlanta Bill's does have decent barbecue, much better than anything they can get in Phili, though still, Dad says, no match for "downhome in Texas." Gracie supposes he could live in Philadelphia until he was a hundred and Texas would still be "downhome."

Mom tears off a paper towel from the roll on the table and wipes her hands. "Eric doesn't think I can be a professor."

Dan looks at Dad with a raised eyebrow. Cory laughs, and, even though Gracie feels bad for her father, she giggles.

"That's not what I said," Dad insists. "I said it's a tight job market."

"Well get your name on a few more papers first," Dan says. "I'm sure Eden knows some professors at Braemore who could use a top notch research assistant like you. They don't have Ph.D. program in psychology, so they can't draw from the student base. She could probably put in a good word for you."

"Well, Dan, I appreciate that." Then, leveling her eyes at Dad. "It's nice to have the support."

"I support you, babe. You'll probably have tenure by next Tuesday."

"I don't even have my doctorate yet."

"Yeah, but, I know how you operate. I've seen you go into interviews for assistant dean and come out the dean."

"Uh-huh," she says, "And then quit a year later before they can fire me."

"They renewed your contract," Dad reminds her.

"Yeah. For one year. And then right back to the politics."

"Which is why you quit. But I'm sure they felt your loss _keenly_."

"Eden sure did," Dan says.

Cory opens one of the wet wipes packages and cleans his fingers. He jerks his head toward the old-school arcade games lined up against the far wall, and Gracie nods and follows him.

Cory opens his wallet and slides a $5 bill into the change machine.

"Oh my God," Gracie says. "They have Area 51. How _old_ is this machine?"

"I get the blue gun." Cory starts feeding coins into the game. It's $2 per play, but she and Cory tried the game once on a two-family trip to Atlantic City, and they lasted almost half an hour before they couldn't get to the next round.

She pulls up the red gun and gets in position. They don't talk for the next ten minutes. They just save the world from monsters and aliens. But her cell honks three times, and finally she tries to shoot one handed while reading the text from Paul: "Good luck tomorrow. I love you. Can't wait to SEE you after." She smiles and slides the phone back in her pocket while the game says, "Reload. Reload. Reload." When she looks up, she realizes she's down a life.

"That was Paul," she says as she shoots off screen to reload. "He says he can't wait to SEE me after." She begins blowing up more monsters. "Which I'm guessing means he's thinking about seeing me na - "

"If you want to fuck Paul," Cory says as he shoves the blue gun back into the holster, "then fuck Paul, but don't talk to me about it like I'm fucking Dr. Don."

Dr. Don is the host of a popular relationship talk show that Cory and O and Gracie mock on a semi-regular basis.

Gracie slides her red gun in the holster and starts following him back toward the table. "What is _**wrong**_ with you?" she asks. Cory doesn't drop f-bombs like most of the guys she knows at school, who seem to think the more they can pack in a sentence, the cooler they are. In fact, she's heard some derivation of the word come out of his mouth only about three times in the past three years. But that was three times in one _sentence_.

He stops and turns. "Nothing. Sorry. I just…Why can't we just talk about guns?"

"Because we don't ever _just_ talk about guns. We talk about _lots_ of stuff. We've _always_ talked about lots of stuff."

He looks away, over to where the adults are laughing and talking and Mom is slapping Dad on his shoulder and Dan is holding up a finger and shaking his head.

"Okay, here's some other stuff," he says. "I'm thinking about quitting the rifle team and trying out for the football team this summer so I can play my senior year. I talked to your dad about it, but I haven't told my dad yet."

"Wow." Gracie steps back a few feet and sits down at an empty, wooden, two person half-booth. "Wow."

He sits down across from her. "I don't want to disappoint my dad, but I'm not going anywhere with this rifle thing."

"Cory, you're the best. You're – "

" - No, Gracie. _You're_ the best. You improve every single year. You've improved by leaps and bounds in just the past month. You might even take an individual medal at Nationals tomorrow. I've never done that. And I never will. Because I've stayed in exactly the same place for the last three years. My score is almost unchanged. Yours goes up a little each year."

"Yeah, but you took the individual gold at State three years in a row!"

"I haven't gotten any better. If you and I competed today, you'd outshoot me, just based on all that practice you did in the last two months alone. I don't think there's any up for me anymore. I love it, I do. I'll always shoot. But…" He shakes his head. "I want to do something where there's an up for me."

"Well, I'm sure my dad's thrilled. Except that he can't coach you."

"Well…maybe he can."

"How? You go to Grant and Dad coaches at Pemberton."

Cory looks over at the adults' table, to make sure they aren't looking this way. Gracie glances back too. They're still engrossed in their laughter and conversation, and Mom now has her arm around Dad's shoulders and is leaning against him, which probably means he's out of the dog house, or she's had a few more beers than she planned, or both.

"Grant's offered your Dad the head coaching job next season."

"Why do you know this before me?"

"Because he hasn't decided if he's going to take it yet. He told me it's a five-year-contract. And your mom _could_ be done with her Ph.D. in two years. And he doesn't know what she's gonna want to do."

"Is there a big bump in pay?"

"Actually, it's ten percent less," Cory says. "But he's considering it."

"Why? Grant's a much worse team than Pemberton's. You guys…you never make it to State. No offense. But why would Dad even want to coach such a sucky team?"

"Uh….Gracie, the Pioneers never made it to State before your dad was head coach either."

"Oh. Yeah."

"It might take him one, two years to build the team up. But he will. He'll get the Grant Yankees to State by his third season. And I think your dad…I think he's bored. There's no challenge in it for him anymore. Taking a crappy team, and making them State Champions? That's less boring. He did it with the Lions in Texas, he did it with the Pioneers, and now he thinks maybe he wants to do it with the Yankees. And he wants me to be part of that process. He knows he won't get us to State his first year, but he thinks he might get us to the playoffs. "

"Wow."

"What do you think?"

"I think if it's what you really want, you should go for it. I'll miss you at the matches, of course, but we can always shoot together."

He slouches down into the booth. "I'm kind of afraid of disappointing my dad."

"Oh, trust me, I know all about disappointing your dad. I told him I might have sex with Paul, and you want to talk about – "

Cory rolls his eyes. " - Back to Paul again. God, Gracie. Can you think of anything else?" He stands up. He glances in the direction of the table, where Dan and Dad are having a tug-of-war over the bill. "Looks like it's almost time to go."


	16. Chapter 16

**Chapter Sixteen**

The National Championships begin at sunrise and end at sundown. Five teams compete in each round, and then the four winners of these four matches square off in a final round. It's been this way for the past five years.

Gracie had trouble sleeping last night. She always does before a match, but it was worse than usual, because last night she wasn't just thinking of targets but of Paul, and she was plucking an imaginary field of daisies: "I should have sex with him, I shouldn't have sex with him, I should have sex with him…."

She does some breathing exercises and tries to clear her mind before her team is called to the range. She's annoyed by her distraction, but when she's prone, and her ears are on, and her sights are lined up, suddenly, every other concern fades away.

Her team makes it to the final round and comes in fourth overall, but she takes the individual bronze, the first Pennsylvanian to earn a medal at Nationals in over ten years.

First her team and coach congratulate her and then her parents. Next is her godfather, and finally Cory, who holds out his hand. She slaps his, and he grabs hold of hers and half shakes it, saying, "You put me to shame, Gracie Belle. You put me to shame."

She smiles. "I try." When she's packing up her gear, she says to Cory, "You guys aren't flying back until tomorrow morning, right?" When he nods, she asks if he wants to meet up for a drink later at the hotel restaurant when the parents are in bed, because her folks always want the lights out before she does.

"A drink?" he asks.

"Something virgin, I mean. Like me," she laughs. "For now."

He frowns, but they do meet up at the hotel bar, where he gets decaf coffee and she gets Diet Coke, because they don't have Diet Red Power or Diet Dr. Pepper. They talk about the competition for a while, then their future college plans. Gracie's still not sure where she wants to go. She's having second thoughts about her whole law school plan. The idea of spending seven more years in school after her senior year of high school seems daunting, confining somehow. The range is so open, so freeing; the classroom is like a cage. But it's never occurred to her that there could be any option other than college and grad school. Dad has his bachelor's. Matt has an art degree. Julie has a Master's in English. And Mom is getting her Ph.D.

The bartender slides her a second Diet Coke. It's clear from his face that he's not thrilled they aren't drinking and that he doesn't expect a good tip.

"Have you ever considered just not going to college?" Gracie asks.

"And doing what?" Cory says.

"I don't know…investing the money you would have spent. Working?"

"My mom's an English professor. My Dad has an M.B.A., even if he hasn't used it in eighteen years. I was forced to read Shakespeare at the age of eleven. So, no, I've never considered it. Besides, how else am I going to find people to talk about higher level math with if I don't go to college? And that stuff is beautiful."

Gracie shakes her head and smiles. Then she frowns. "Hey, Cory, can I tell you something?"

"As long as it's not about Paul."

"It kind of hurt me what you said the other day."

"What?" he asks, his face blank with confusion.

"About not thinking of me as family. I've always thought of you as my brother. We're so close. Aren't we?"

"Yeah. But you are aware, aren't you, that we aren't actually blood related?"

"Of course I meant my _metaphorical_ brother. Why would you say you don't you think of me as a sister?"

"Because I _don't_. I…" He sighs and shakes his head. "God, Gracie, you're dense."

"_**Excuse me**__?_"

"Everyone knows. O knows. My mom knows. Your mom knows. My dad knows. Hell, even _your_ dad knows."

"Knows what?"

"That I've been in love with you since we were fourteen years old."

She laughs, and then she sees he isn't laughing. "Cory," she says, her voice a blend of confusion and sympathy.

He holds up a hand. "Don't," he says. "Don't. I know you don't feel that way. I don't have any false illusions." He reaches in his pocket and pulls out his wallet. "I know you think of me as a brother, that you always have, but that doesn't mean _I_ have to think of _you_ that way." He throws some bills on the bar. "And I was happy to let you keep being oblivious, because I was afraid you knowing would make things all awkward."

"Cory – "

He shoves his wallet back in his jeans. His voice has grown thick. "But I can't _stand_ you talking about Paul to me all the time. I can't _sit _around and listen to that shit and just nod. So I thought you ought to know. So you can at least stop doing that."

He stands up from the stool.

"Cory – "

He whirls around and hits his foot on a table. He curses and stumbles off, as if he'd had beer instead of coffee.

**/FNL/**

The next day Mom drags Gracie and Dad around to a bunch of museums in Atlanta. At the café of the Fernbank Science Center, Gracie texts Cory to tell him he should have stayed an extra day, because he'd love the electron microscope lab. He doesn't reply. At the High Museum of Art, she texts him that his mom would like the African art section, and again he doesn't reply. At the Civil War Museum, she texts, "Finally, guns!" but again he doesn't reply.

That evening at dinner, Gracie presses her thumbs against the keypad of her cell phone: "Not brother and sister then. But good friends. Can't we still be friends? "

Cory finally responds: "Of course. Always."

But it's going to be weird now. No denying that. In fact, that's the last text of the day he sends her, when normally they text each other fifteen times a day. So she texts back and forth with Paul even more than she usually does.

In the early morning, they start heading home. They aren't too far outside of Atlanta when Dad gets off the highway. Gracie doesn't think anything of it. He's probably stopping for coffee. She knows he didn't sleep much last night. She woke up when the door latched at one o'clock and again when it latched at four. Maybe he was pacing the halls over Paul. He hasn't tried to talk to her about it again. She hates to disappoint him, but it's not his decision. Like Mom said, it's her body. Still, a part of her feels like, whether or not she chooses to have sex with Paul, before long, she isn't going to be Daddy's little girl anymore. The day has to come eventually, one way or another, but that knowledge doesn't soften the pang. She wonders if this is how Julie felt when she was growing up, or if her big sister was just glad to strike out and be free of Mom and Dad.

She texts Paul again. "Long drive ahead." He replies, "Hang in there. Miss you."

When she looks up again, Dad is on some kind of backroad, and he keeps making turns and driving farther and farther off the beaten path. They pass houses with overgrown yards, dirt and gravel driveways, screen doors hanging off their hinges, cars up on blocks, paint chipping and peeling around the windows. "What are we doing here?" she asks. "Did you get lost?"

"Your father just wants to drive by his childhood home," Mom says.

"What?" Gracie practically shouts from the back seat. "You aren't a _native_ Texan?"

"Shhhh!" Mom says. "Nobody knows but family, Gracie. Keep it to yourself. Especially when we go back to Texas to visit."

"I moved to west Texas when I was three," Dad says. "But I was born…." the car slows to a stop "…here."

Gracie looks out the window at the house. Every house around it has wild grass up to the stairs, but it has a little cobble stone path. Every house around it has grime caked doors, but it has a colorful wreath hanging over the door knob against the freshly painted surface.

"They've taken really good care of it," Mom says.

"Sure didn't look like that when I was born here. Looked like all the rest."

"Well, you weren't actually _born_ there," Gracie says a little pedantically. "You mean you were born in the hospital."

"No. Your father was born there. In the bathtub. His mom's labor came on really fast and before she knew it…"

"Oh my God," Gracie says.

"His dad was a traveling salesman," Mom continues, "and he was out of town, and she was completely alone."

"Brave thing, mama," Dad says sadly. "Wish I'd known her."

"You didn't know her?" Gracie asks, putting he cell phone down on the backseat ad ignoring the buzz of Paul's latest message. "At all?"

"She died from complications in childbirth," Mom says. "Your dad made it though, thank God. A neighbor heard the screams and came and helped deliver your father near the end. And then got them both to the hospital, but…." Mom puts and arm around Dad's shoulders and kisses him.

Gracie swallows a lump in her throat. She knew her grandmother on her dad's side was dead before she was ever born, but she never asked any questions about the woman. "Geez, Dad…I'm sorry." Grandpa was still alive, but Gracie only heard from him at Christmas and her birthday. "You don't blame grandpa for being away when she died, do you? That's not why you hardly ever talk to him, is it?"

"Nah," Dad says. "There's a lot more to it than that."

"Years to it," Mom mutters.

Gracie can't imagine not having a relationship with her parents as a grown-up, but she's never had grandparents as a part of her own life. It scares her for a moment, and then she remembers how involved Mom and Dad are with Henry, how they call and e-mail regularly, how their grandson stays with them for a four-day weekend twice a year so Matt and Julie can get away alone together, how the Saracens and Taylors always spend either Christmas or Thanksgiving together, and how the two families have a joint vacation every year. If Gracie ever has kids, she knows her parents will be a part of their lives.

She looks again at the neighborhood. For some reason, it never occurred to her that her parents might once have been poor. They live in a 3,000 square foot house with lofty ceilings and stainless steel appliances and granite countertops. "When did you stop being poor?" she asks.

Dad laughs.

"I don't think either your dad or I have been _poor_ since we were in our early twenties. But we were _frugal_ for many, many years. Until one day, suddenly, it seemed we didn't need a budget anymore."

"And then we did again," Dad says.

Mom smiles. "And then we didn't…and then we did. That's life sometimes, Gracie."

"When you're a troublemaker," Dad tells her with a smirk.

"Or when you've got people trying to bring you down."

"Paranoid much, Mom?"

Dad turns on the car. "Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they aren't out to get you. People have tried to get either me or your mom fired more than once."

Mom nods. "And they've succeeded three times." She kisses his cheek, whispers something – probably _I love you_ – in his ear, and then he starts driving again.


	17. Chapter 17

**Chapter Seventeen**

When they return from Atlanta, Gracie tells Paul she needs a few more days to decide. "Okay," he says. "Take all the time you need. But also…remember I'm going to college in three weeks. No pressure. Just…I'm leaving soon."

Meanwhile, Dad takes the offer from Grant High. Mom tells him to go ahead, that when she finishes her Ph.D., she'll do research in the Phili area for a couple years, and then, when his five-year contract with Grant is about to come up, she'll apply for professorates all over the country, at which point he'll move with her and coach somewhere, anywhere.

There are some hard feelings when Dad leaves the Pioneers, but not a lot. Every year people expect him to leave, so it's more of a pleasant surprise when he doesn't than a disappointment when he finally does. When he leaves, he tells the administration and boosters that their best bet for replacing him is assistant Coach Howard. They shake their heads at the possibility of a female head coach. They didn't even much like it when he brought her on as an assistant coach years ago, but as long as Dad was winning games, they weren't going to cross him.

Over dinner one evening, Dad tells Coach Howard, "Jess, if they don't make you head coach, then you're welcome to come over to Grant with me. Because if they don't have the sense to promote you, they shouldn't benefit from you at Pemberton."

Coach Howard smiles, this big-as-Texas smile she has. Gracie's always liked her. The fact that Dad had Coach Howard as his right hand woman at Pemberton always made her feel more secure about her interest in marksmanship. She watched Coach Howard blaze a trail in a man's world when she was growing up.

"Oh, they'll make her head coach," Mr. Howard says with assurance. Mr. Howard used to play for the Philadelphia Eagles, before he broke his leg five years ago. He proposed to Coach Howard six years ago, on National TV, at a playoff game. She was Coach Meriwether then. "But what are you gonna do, Coach, the first time your protégé beats you at your own game?"

Dad chuckles and reaches for his wine glass. "I'll tell you what I'm gonna do, Vince. Be damn proud. That's what. And then retire."

"You'll never retire," Mom says. "I couldn't stand to have you around the house."

Coach Howard and Mr. Howard laugh, and Mom starts passing the bread.

Dad winks at her. "You won't even _be_ around the house. You'll be too busy lecturing, _Dr._ Taylor."

"Not yet, sugar," she says. "You can't start calling me that quite yet."

**/FNL/**

Cory comes to summer try outs for Grant, but it's a mere formality, because Dad has already told him he's going to be QB1 of the Yankees. Some of the Pioneers players begin to come forward, one by one, to tell the boosters that there's no better option than Coach Howard. "Coach Taylor knows what he's talking about," they say. "You've always trusted him. But you don't want to take his parting advice on this?"

The boosters are swayed. They put pressure on the administration. And, in turn, Jess Howard becomes head coach of the Pemberton Pioneers, just in time for summer training.

**/FNL/ **

"Be honest with me," Gracie insists. She's lying on top of her burgundy comforter. Burgundy is her favorite color. It's dark, but not too dark. The moonlight makes a faint, tentacled pattern on her ceiling. "You were _not_ a virgin when you got married."

She's got her cell phone to her ear, and she's called Julie because she's told everyone – from Cory to O to Mom to Dad to Sandra – that she's considering sex with Paul. So she figured she might as well let her big sister weigh in, even though she already thinks she knows what Julie is going to say.

"Well…Matt was my first."

"Half confession."

"Look, okay, fine. I lied. Matt _was_ my first, and he _is_ going to be my last. I mean, assuming he doesn't die while I still care about sex. But he wasn't my only. And the thing is Gracie, I kind of wish he _was_. I wish I'd made some different choices in my life."

Gracie's not at all surprised to learn Julie was not a virgin on her wedding night. She knew Julie had to be lying about that. But she _is_ a little surprised to learn her big sister had sex with someone other than Matt. "Really? There was someone else?"

"Come on. Don't act so shocked. You know I broke up with Matt once. And he broke up with me once. "

"Yeah, I know, but I didn't know you had another serious boyfriend. And you never told me- why _did_ you break up with Matt in high school anyway?"

"I was so afraid he and I would become like Mom and Dad."

"What's wrong with being like Mom and Dad?" Gracie asks, confused. "They love each other. They support each other. I mean, they have their bad moments, but they always stick together in the end. Compared to a lot of my friends' parents…they have a really good marriage."

"I know. I realize that now. Just, when I was a teenager…it seemed so…boring. What they had. I wanted something more exciting. So for a while I chased guys who seemed more exciting. Like this Swedish guy who turned out to be a total pretentious ass. And this Habitat for Humanity guy who turned out to be a total pretentious ass. And this – "

"- So how many guys _did_ you have sex with?"

"Other than Matt, just this one guy. This guy…he was my T.A. in college…"

"Your _T.A._? Isn't that against some kind of school rule?"

"No. Well. I don't know. It was stupid. I also hurt some people doing it. And I disappointed some people. Including myself. But you've clearly got a lot more sense than I did at your age. So trust yourself. When it comes to Paul, trust your own judgment. Because what the hell do I know?"

Gracie is silent. Her big sister is admitting she doesn't know something? Julie Saracen? She's deferring to Gracie? Has the world spun off its axis?

"Paul's really sweet," Gracie says. "And he's not pressuring me or anything. He just really wants to. So do I. He's so cute, Julie."

"I know. You texted me that photo, remember?"

"And I'm pretty sure I love him."

There's a twinge of caution in Julie's voice. "Pretty sure? Why only pretty sure?"

"Did you know with Matt? Before you guys did it the first time, did you know for sure?"

"Yeah. Yeah I did know for sure."

"But then you forgot that you knew and you dumped him?"

Julie sighs. "Listen, Gracie, I was a really good kid in elementary and junior high. And then at some point I guess I just had to get all of my stupid out."

Gracie giggles.

"But you don't have to do that. Not everyone has to do that. I think it's probably possible for some rare people to go through life without royally screwing up. I hope you're one of them. Just…you care about Paul. And he cares about you. So whatever you decide, it's not the end of the world. Either way. Just do what you feel is right. That's all you can do."

"Thanks, Julie," she says, and means it. She's never had this honest a conversation with her sister before. "I think I want to. It's just…all this caution. Mom's not happy about it. Dad's _really_ not happy about it."

"Well, Dad. You know. He's still not happy that Matt and I are having sex."

Gracie laughs.

"But he has to accept that you're becoming a woman. If not now, then soon."

"And Cory's not happy about it either," Gracie says, "because apparently he's in love with me."

"You finally figured that out?"

"What?" Julie's met Cory a few times. The Saracens, the Harrises, and the Taylors have all had Thanksgiving dinner together twice and they've been to the beach together once. "_You_ knew? _How?_"

"It was kind of obvious last Thanksgiving. The way he looked at you."

Gracie groans and rolls on her side and toys with the frills on one of her pillows. "I majorly did not see it."

"So is it weird now that you know?"

"Yeah," Gracie admits. "But we still hang out together." They see each other at the range, and when the families get together for dinner. "We're back to semi-normal now." The truth is, she's always been so much herself with Cory that her openness has become a habit that not even the awkwardness of his unreciprocated feelings can break. "I just avoid talking about Paul around him."

Gracie and Julie talk a little longer. When Gracie hangs up the phone, she rolls onto her back and studies the light on the ceiling. She imagines Paul's hands on her body, caressing her, exploring her, taking her places she's never been. She drifts off to sleep, and she dreams of falling, slowly, as if through thin whips of cotton.


	18. Chapter 18

**Chapter Eighteen**

Gracie tells Paul she's ready. They plan to do _it _next Saturday, because his single mother is going to be out of town for an overnight business trip, and they'll have Paul's house all to themselves. Gracie plots an alibi with Sandra, at whose house she will presumably be spending the night. Despite her open conversation with Mom, Gracie doesn't really want her parents to know what's going down when it's going down.

Today, however, Gracie is still a virgin, and Mom is throwing her a "family" birthday party. Mom has baked a cake and has just placed Gracie's favorite dinner, lasagna (which happens to be Dad's favorite too), in the oven. "Family" means Mom and Dad and O and Cory and Dan and Eden, but Mom has also invited Paul.

Before everyone comes over, Gracie puts the leaf in the dining room table as Mom frosts the cake in the kitchen. Dad trails in from the other side and says something to Mom. Gracie overhears only, "…bad idea… both in the same room."

Mom's response is clearer: "Cory is a mature young man. He's not an idiot. He's not going to tackle Paul over the dinner table."

"Sometimes I don't think you understand the male human heart, Tami."

"Well…." Here Gracie loses Mom's response until "…the range, with _guns_, and if Dan can trust Cory in that situation, then I certainly think we can trust him with birthday candles."

The table now expanded, Gracie starts setting it with cloth napkins. The acoustics are pretty remarkable in this house. It's why she half whispers on the phone when she talks to Paul. She can hear Dad again: "…me an idiot, but what about your part?"

"_My_ part?"

"Yeah, what did you expect to happen after putting me in that situation?"

And Mom, in partial: "….situation…involving good steak?"

"I mean rubbing my nose in it!"

Mom, fading in and out: "…not….nose….what?"

"In how successful your ex-boyfriend was. Dragging me to that cocktail party, making me watch him take off in his own personal charity helicopter he bought with his mountain of real estate mogul cash. And then inviting him to _my_ football game? _My_ game? And letting him hold _my_ baby? I _put_ that baby in you!"

"Oh, Lord, Eric."

"And as if that wasn't enough, you have to drag me to a fancy dinner with him, which you know he's going to insist on paying for with the cash he's got flowing out his– "

"- Lord, Eric. That was over sixteen years ago."

"How smart was that, Tami?"

"You're right. I should have predicted you'd behave like a jealous, macho – "

"- Oh no, no. No you don't. Think about it. Just. Think. About. It. Suppose it was the other way around. Suppose some ex-girlfriend of mine blew into Dillon after becoming a supermodel. And I made you go to a cocktail party charity photo shoot."

"A charity photo shoot?"

"Where she flirted with me."

"Mo didn't really – "

"- And then I invited her to take Gracie for a walk in the stroller and she pushed the stroller around in her short shorts."

"Her short shorts? Why not her swimsuit, Eric?"

"And then I said, Tami, hon, now my sexy supermodel ex-girlfriend wants to go to dinner with us. You're perfectly fine with that, right?"

"Eric, honey…okay, maybe you have a little bit of a point, but none of that justifies you outright _tackling_ Mo and making a public spectacle and becoming the talk of the town for a week! You acted like an idiot. Just admit it!"

"I'm the idiot, huh?" he says, but he doesn't sound particularly angry. He sounds almost like he's chuckling a little. "Well what kind of idiot marries an idiot and stays married to him for over thirty years? Huh? Tell me that."

Mom's laugh is soft, light, flirtatious. "A very _forgiving_ idiot."

Dad's laugh is low, amused, appreciative. "God, I love you, Tami Taylor. Sometimes I have no idea why, but I do."

"I love you too. Every last idiotic inch of you."

And then it's quiet. Gracie's done setting the table, but she decides to go through the living room instead of through the kitchen, because, at this point, she's pretty sure they're making out in there.

**/FNL/**

Gracie actually thinks Dad is right. Maybe not about this Mo guy – she doesn't have the full story there – but she certainly wishes Mom had _**not**_ invited Paul. The evening is awkward, even if Cory doesn't tackle Paul over the dining room table.

Cory picks the seat farthest from her at the dining room table and then again in the living room when they retreat there for the traditional opening of the presents. Matt and Julie have sent her a gift certificate to Bass Pro Shops because, Julie writes, "We never know what kind of gear to get you." Dan gives Gracie three boxes of ammunition for her rifle. Eden, who refuses to buy e-Books for people, gives her a large, hardback, illustrated volume on the history of rifles. O gives her a CD of one of her favorite musicians. O is with CD's like his mom is with books. He still goes to those used CD stores to buy ancient hardcopy rather than just downloading everything. Gracie doesn't have the heart to tell him she doesn't even own a CD player.

Mom and Dad give her a tiny box which she assumes is jewelry, but turns out to be car keys. She jumps and squeals and says, "Where is it? Where is it?"

"It's used," Dad warns her. "And just two doors, but it's got good trunk space for your rifle." They all go out on the street and walk the half block to where Dad's parked it. When they get there, he sticks a tiny red bow on the hood, tells her happy birthday, and hugs her.

"I love it!" she says, popping the trunk and making sure it really does have space. Then she looks inside the driver's side window. It's used all right. Ancient, apparently, because it has a CD player, though she's sure Dad has had the carefully inspected for safety. "Look, O," she says. "You'll love this."

"Retro," he says as he peers inside at the player.

When they get back to the living room, there are two gifts left on the coffee table, Paul's and Cory's. Gracie rips Paul's open with glee. It's a necklace, a golden chain with a small, green, heart-shaped jewel pendant. "It's peridot," he says. "Your birthstone. I hope you like it."

"It's gorgeous!" She puts it on right away, admires the jewel, and then kisses Paul quickly, while Cory looks out the living room window. She doesn't make a big display of it, not in front of him. Finally, she reaches for Cory's present. He turns his head back slightly from the window and watches as she opens it.

The box contains yet another necklace, very different from the one Paul gave her. It has a simple, black rope for a chain, and at the end of it dangles sculpted, flowering metal.

"What on earth is that?" Paul asks, while Cory grits his teeth and drops his eyes to his shoes.

"It's made from a bullet," Gracie says. "Well, from the shell casings of bullets." Dan bought her something like it when he took her to her first gun show as a young child, but this is much more delicate and creative and beautiful, and the metal is very thin, like maybe the artist used .22 ammunition, which must have been hard to do. "Did you get it at the gun show last weekend?"

"No…uh…I made it myself," Cory says. "I used my chemistry set to melt it down to…" He trails off. "Some of my dad's tools," he mutters. "Anyway… I made it."

She looks at the necklace, but she can't put it on, because she already has Paul's on. She'll wear it occasionally when Paul's away at college.

"That's kind of weird isn't it," Paul says, "wearing an instrument of death around your neck?"

Gracie reaches over and tugs playfully on his crucifix. "Really? You think?"

He smiles. "Point taken. But this cross is symbolic."

She fingers the flowering brass on the necklace Cory gave her. "So is this, I think." She looks at Cory, who remains quite fixated on his feet. "This is why you insisted on collecting some of the brass at Nationals, isn't it? These casings are from Nationals, aren't they?"

"Yeah," Cory mutters. "They may not actually be yours…who knows…but…uh….thought it would be kind of commemorative."

"Commemorative?" Paul asks. "Well I really think that's what she got the bronze medal for." He smiles, like he means it as a joke, but it's a tight-lipped smile.

Gracie puts an arm around Paul's shoulders and kisses his cheek in hopes the sop of affection will soothe his ruffled feathers.

The adults are passing glances among each other like a hot potato. Mom says, "I didn't know you were so artistic, Cory."

"Well, I'm not, really…I used a proportional geometric pattern."

Dan laughs. "Of course you did. The same way you shoot – by math, not by instinct. But it works. And it works well. It's a shame you're giving up rifle for football."

"I'm not giving up rifle, Dad. I'm just quitting the rifle team. I still plan to shoot every Saturday, you know."

Later, when the house has cleared out and Gracie walks Paul to his car, he leans back against it and puts his hands on her hips and they kiss for a while. Eventually, he pulls away and says, "So that was kind of weird, huh?"

"What?" she asks.

"Cory. And that bizarre necklace. I mean, jewelry is kind of a boyfriend present, isn't it? Not a friend present."

"I told you. Cory is like family to me."

"Maybe to you, but I kind of get the impression Cory… " Paul shrugs. "Never mind." He runs a fingertip lightly over her neck and down to where the pendant dips into her cleavage. Her breath thickens as he slides another finger in and just brushes the side of one breast as he draws out the jewel. "You like it?" he asks.

The truth is, she likes Cory's necklace better, but she can't expect Paul to know her tastes as well. They've only been dating a little while. Cory's known her forever. She can't expect Paul to understand her in so short a time. After all, it's only been a few months.

_And yet you're getting ready to give your virginity to him?_ She doesn't know whose voice that is: Dad's or Mom's or Cory's or Julie's or her own. She shakes it from her mind. Her flesh is still warm where Paul brushed her. She bites down on her bottom lip and nods.

Still holding the pendant, he leans in and kisses the base of her neck, and then her cheek, and then her ear. He whispers, "I'm really looking forward to Saturday night." When he pulls away his eyes are twinkling and there's a dimple in his well-chiseled cheek. God, he's beautiful.

A little shiver of excitement shoots through her spine. "Me too."


	19. Chapter 19

**Chapter Nineteen**

When Gracie says she's sleeping over at Sandra's, Mom and Dad probably both suspect otherwise. Dad looks like he's about to vomit when she walks through the door with the duffle bag, and Mom like she's going to cry. But they don't say anything. Maybe they call Sandra's mom after, to check, but if they catch her in her lie, they don't call her up and say so. They must think it's better this way, at least, than in the backseat of the Dodge Economy.

She and Paul are lying mostly clothed in his bed, kissing, and Paul's just starting to unzip her skirt – the semi-short, tight one she's worn just for him - when Gracie says, "I can't. I'm sorry. I can't. I want to, but…what if one of us regrets it?"

"But, Gracie, you said – "

"- I'm majorly attracted to you, and I think I love you, but I want to be sure. This is a really big deal to me."

"It's a big deal to me too!"

"I know. I don't ever want this to be something _either_ of us regrets."

His face falls. "Please?" he says.

"I'm sorry. I can't."

He closes his eyes and breathes in. "You couldn't have decided this before we were in bed?"

"We're _still_ dressed. Don't be angry. Please don't be angry with me."

"I gave you plenty of time to think about it. Why couldn't you tell me earlier?"

"I didn't decide until just now."

He sits up. Then he stands. He paces the floor and runs his hand through his dense, blond hair.

"Paul, I'm sorry."

"So you said."

"Please don't be mad at me."

"I'm not mad!" He lowers his voice. "I'm…Look, I'm leaving soon. Let's just make this a good night, okay? Let's just go out. Where do you want me to take you?"

They go to the park where they walked together on their first date. They stroll hand in hand, but they don't talk much. "You said it wouldn't change anything between us," she says, "If I said no. You promised."

"It hasn't changed anything," he assures her. "I love you." But he takes her home at nine-thirty.

When she comes in the foyer, there's a sound of sudden rustling in the living room, and when she passes it, her parents have the throw blanket that usually lies across the back of the couch drawn up almost to their necks. Mom, hair a bit ruffled, breathing a little hard, says, "Gracie, we thought you were spending the night at Sandra's."

Dad is breathing hard too, and there's a fine perspiration on his brow.

Were they fooling around when she walked in? Were they _doing it_? On the living room _couch_? Are they _naked_ under there? She doesn't see any clothes on the floor, but she doesn't take the time to look for them either. She turns her head abruptly away. "Yeah," she says hastily, "that didn't work out," and then she runs up to her room.

She guesses they must have bought her Sandra story after all, their expressions when she left notwithstanding. Or maybe they didn't, and Mom was just distracting Dad so he wouldn't vomit, or Dad was distracting Mom so she wouldn't cry. Gracie doesn't know. She doesn't want to know.

She lies on her bed, on her back, and stares at the shadow-patterned ceiling. At some point she cries. And at some point she sleeps.

**/FNL/**

In the morning, before Mom goes to her summer psychology seminar, she studies Gracie, who is poking at the cereal she's not eating. "Are you okay, sweetie?"

"Fine," Gracie insists.

In the afternoon, when he gets back from summer training, Dad looks at Gracie, who's sitting in the arm chair – certainly not the couch - and staring vacantly out the living room window. "Are you okay, peanut?"

"Fine," she says.

In the evening, over dinner, they _both_ ask her if she's okay.

"Paul and I didn't do it last night," she says finally. "In case that makes you feel better."

"If he's worth his salt," Mom says, "it won't change anything."

"And if it does," Dad says, "he doesn't deserve you."

"Thanks," she says.

Paul keeps saying it hasn't changed anything. He takes her out his last two nights in Phili. Tonight, as they watch a movie in the local theatre, she rests her head on his shoulder, but he feels stiff. He walks her to her door when he brings her home and kisses her goodnight, but it doesn't feel right. Maybe it's her imagination, because he's clearly _saying_ and _doing_ all the right things.

When he heads off for college, Paul stops by the house, says goodbye to her parents, tells Gracie he'll miss her, and kisses her goodbye.

"I love you," she half whispers when they're standing by his car. It's the first time she's said it without the _I think_, and maybe what she really means is _I'm afraid of losing you_, but she can't say that, because that's even harder to say than _I love you_. "I love you so much."

"I know," he says.

Just…_I know._


	20. Chapter 20

**Chapter Twenty**

Gracie's senior year gets off to a surprisingly fast start. She's taking three AP classes her mom talked her into, and she's already rolling in homework the first week. She wonders how she's ever going to make it through college. In class, she daydreams of escaping to the range and sketches targets when she's supposed to be taking notes.

When the first football game of the season rolls around, she has to adjust to cheering for Grant. They aren't playing Pemberton, so there's nothing traitorous in rooting for them over Marcus High, but it still feels weird. She's not rooting for Grant, really, but for Dad, and for Cory, who turns in a pretty spectacular performance and gains the adulation of the crowd. Grant, which always loses to Marcus, wins the game with a field goal.

Cory goes to a football party after the victory, but Gracie ends up hanging out with O and Sandra instead. Cory invites them all, but O says, "I don't know any of those jocks. I don't want to go," and that's about how Gracie feels. She _can_ talk about football; you can't live with Dad and not assimilate some terminology and at least a basic respect for the game, but she doesn't drink, she doesn't make out with guys she's not already dating, and she doesn't know what else she'd do at a football party, or any party, really. To her a party is three or four good friends.

"Please?" Cory asks them. It's clear he doesn't want to go alone. He's like Gracie in that regard. He hates small talk, and fun for him is close friends.

"If you don't want to go," O says. "Then just don't go. Hang with us."

"I have to go. My whole team's going to be there."

O shrugs. "Then go. Don't worry. You won't have to make conversation. You're a football star now. The girls who are falling all over you will make the conversation. Just smile."

Cory nods and they don't see him the rest of the night.

The next morning, Gracie goes early to the range. She wants to get in some shooting before Paul gets home. He didn't come home last weekend, and he didn't want to drive on Friday night, but he's supposed to roll in by one o'clock today and they're going out to lunch. She's eager to see him. He texts every day, but he hasn't been able to talk every night after all. He's so busy with his school work. Or at least that's what he says.

Cory's at the range too, but he seems very tired, and Dan scolds him for only firing a three-inch group. Cory snaps back at his father and then goes to take a break on the rock. Dan, who has just sighted in another rifle, begins shooting over Cory's target. When he's done, he pulls off his ears and asks Gracie if she wants to try the new gun.

She slides off her ears. "You should go easier on Cory."

"I would, if he hadn't been dropped off fall-down drunk last night and I hadn't had to carry him inside and he hadn't vomited all over my wife's new carpet."

Gracie's eyes widen. "Cory?"

"Yep. You can thank your dad for me for getting him in with the right crowd."

"Hey," Gracie says sharply. "Hey, my Dad is a molder of men." (She's picked the phrase up from Mom, who tells him that at least twice a year.)

"Oh, yeah, he's going to mold Cory into a _real_ man finally. Cory's developing all sorts of confidence he never had. I mean, before, he only had confidence in his school work and his marksmanship, but now, he's finally _popular_, which is what _really_ matters."

Gracie winces at the tone in Dan's voice. He's Dad's best friend. They're very different men, but they've always gotten along so well. She doesn't like what he's saying, but especially not the way he's saying it.

Yet she wonders if he doesn't have a point. Dad thinks it's important for a team to build comradery, and sometimes he winks at the way that's done. Things he'd be dismayed if _she_ did, he half smiles when _they_ do.

Still, Dad loves his players, and he cares about their characters. She's seen him make some of them into better boys. She can't imagine him letting Cory forget where he came from or what matters most. "Dad's not going to let Cory get too far out of line. He loves Cory like a son. You _know_ my Dad."

Dan sighs. "Yeah. Yeah I know. I'm just…" He shakes his head. "I'm frustrated that…" He glances back toward the rock, where Cory is drinking a bottle of water and rubbing his head. "I just feel like I'm losing my son."

"You're not. He's just got a renewed interest in football. Let him know you're proud of him for his skill in _that_."

Dan laughs. "Ah, Gracie Belle, you are wise beyond your years, young lady. You always have been. God, I can still remember the first time I took you to the range. The way you talked back to me."

"I'm much more respectful now."

"Uh-huh," he says. "And every bit as stubborn." He nods to the range. "I've got to collect my brass. Take ten?"

She agrees and goes and joins Cory on the rock beneath the shade of the Silver Maple. He barely glances at her, until he notices she's wearing the necklace he gave her, and then he smiles slightly. She has Paul's in her gear bag. She'll switch them out later before she sees her boyfriend this afternoon. She doesn't want Paul to be jealous of Cory, especially when there's nothing there, at least not on her side.

"Have you ever walked in on your parents when they were having sex?" Gracie asks.

"Ewwwww," Cory groans. "Why, did you?"

"A couple weeks ago. I think so anyway. They were on the _couch_. I mean, I _sit_ on that couch!"

He laughs.

"You know," she says, "I think I did it a couple times when I was a little kid too. I just didn't realize it at the time. I was so young. And they'd be under the blankets in bed and I'd be like – _Mom, why are you lying on top of Dad?_ – and she'd be, all cheerful and innocent, _We were just cuddling!_ And only Dad's face would be above the blanket, and he would look all annoyed and say, _Go back to bed. Now!_" Gracie shakes her head. "And then they put that deadbolt on the bedroom door when I was five."

Cory laughs harder. When his laughter dies down, he says, "My parents don't have sex."

"Somehow they got you and O."

"Artificial insemination. That's why they got twins."

"You keep telling yourself that. Your mom is ten years younger than Dan, and she is hot. I bet a lot of horny college boys sign up for Shakespeare."

"Hey, that's my _mom_ you're talking about."

She's about to tease him further when she gets a text from Paul. "Got a late start. Won't make it in until seven. We'll do dinner." She grimaces.

"Something wrong?" Cory asks.

"Nothing," she says, and shoves the phone back in her pocket.

"You look upset."

"So I heard Mr. Conscientious did a bit of underage drinking last night. Got wasted. Is that why you look so tired?"

He takes a sip of his water bottle. "I misjudged," he said.

"Was it fun?"

"For a little while, but, overall…I don't really get it, Gracie. I'm trying to fit in on this team. But the truth is, I'd rather have been…" His thick eyelashes flutter as he peers at her "…with you." Why does he have to do that? He knows they're just going to be friends. "And O and Sandra," he says quickly. "All you guys."

Dan is approaching the rock, and Cory turns his attention to his father. "I want to show you something about this rifle, Cory," Dan says, jerking his head back toward the range. Cory slides off the rock. He puts on double ear protection, balling up the orange plugs and shoving them deep in his ears and then sliding the earmuffs on top of that. Dan taps Cory's forehead with one finger. "Don't worry, my boy," he shouts. "Only one more hour of gunshots. Then maybe you won't drink so much next Friday."

**/FNL/ **

That evening, Paul takes Gracie out for a late dinner at one the chain restaurants. He talks a lot about college, and how he's not as into church history anymore, how it's really his theology class that's captured his interest. He throws out a lot of religious terminology she doesn't understand. He's strangely chaste with her when he drops her off, kissing her briefly on the lips and drawing away when she tries to make it french. He asks her if she wants to go to mass with him Sunday morning.

She does go to mass with him, but she feels like a newbie at the firing range. There's a bunch of crossing that she doesn't do in her church, foreign nomenclature, and people reciting scores of words in unison. Some of the words are printed in the bulletin, but she's always scanning to find where they are, and sometimes the bulletin refers her to a book that she has to grab from the pew, and then she's rustling to find the right page, while Paul just says it all from memory. They sit and stand and sit and kneel and she's always one step behind. She has to keep watching everyone else to make sure she's doing it right. She feels like a fool sitting alone in the pew while the rest of the row goes up for communion. Throughout it all, Paul looks at her a couple times and smiles, but otherwise he just seems really into the service.

Afterwards, they go out for breakfast, and she tells him about her upcoming rifle match. He takes her home before heading back to college. He says he wants to get an early start on the drive because he needs to study tonight. He kisses her quickly goodbye - - on the cheek and not on the lips - - and says, "I had fun this weekend. Thanks."

"I love you," she says.

He looks like he's thinking about it. "I can honestly say I love you too."

"Uh…okay. Good."

Just plain "I love you, too" would have been more normal. What does he mean, he can _honestly_ say it? Did he _dishonestly_ say it the first time?


	21. Chapter 21

**Chapter 21**

The next football game of the season pits the Yankees and the Pioneers at Pemberton High's stadium. Gracie asks on the drive over, "So where do we sit? The home side is our school," (Mom's still a guidance counselor at Pemberton, though that will surely change when she has her Ph.D.), "but Dad is coaching the visitors. And there's Cory."

"Well," Mom says, "blood is thicker than water."

They find a spot in the visitor's bleachers with Dan and Eden. O is apparently on the home side with Sandra, even though Grant's his school.

Grant usually loses spectacularly to Pemberton, at least it did when Dad was head coach of the Pioneers. Coach Jess Howard plays a good, hard, fair game, but in the end, the Grant Yankees just eke out a victory. Dad, who usually shakes hands with the losing coaches, hugs Coach Howard instead, and he talks with her for a few minutes afterwards. She looks very studious and nods a lot.

The Taylors and Harrisses make their way to the field. Mom hugs Dad and tells him she's proud of him, and Dan and Eden do the same with Cory. Just as Cory steps away from his mother, a busty, red-headed Grant cheerleader runs up to him and asks if he's going to the party after.

"Nah," he tells the girl. "I think I'm gonna just go out with my parents tonight to celebrate."

The redhead glances at Gracie and smiles and then bounces off. Gracie instantly dislikes her.

The Taylors and Harrises end up going out together, less O, who's going with Sandra to Pemberton's homecoming dance. Gracie's not going to the homecoming dance because Paul said he couldn't make it down for it, and she doesn't like going to dances without a date. Too many boys ask her to dance, and she isn't very graceful, and the slow dances feel especially awkward, not to mention the stilted conversation.

They pick a brick oven pizzeria. Ten minutes after they order, Dad is looking around at the passing waitresses, impatient for his food.

"Hungry, baby?" Mom asks, smoothing the hair on the top of his head. It's been ruffled from being underneath his cap, which he hung on the post of his chair when Mom asked him to please take his hat off at the table. (Dad obeyed promptly, and Eden turned to Gracie's godfather and said, "You see that, Daniel? He doesn't passive-aggressively push it down further on his head when she asks." And Dan: "You wouldn't love me half as much if I were compliant.")

"I always ate _before_ the games in Texas," Dad grumbles. "I've never figured out what to do here. This four in the afternoon crap…it ain't right. You don't start a game at four."

Mom pats his shoulder sympathetically. "Well, they don't have those big ol' Friday night lights at all the schools, hon."

"I know. I know."

Under the table, Gracie texts Paul for the third time in three hours. "Where ARE you? I said I miss you already. XOXOX"

"Cory, you were really good out there," Dan says. "And I'm sorry I've been kind of a jerk about the football thing."

Gracie looks up. Cory is fiddling with his napkin ring.

"You've got so many talents," Dan tells his son. "The math, the science, marksmanship, football…I hope you land on the one that's going to make you happy. _Whatever_ that is. I mean that."

Cory's lips curve. "Thanks, Dad," he says to his napkin. He pushes back his chair. "Excuse me. I need to use the restroom."

When Cory is out of ear shot, Dan raises his pint glass to Dad and congratulates him on the game. After they clink glasses, Dan says, "About Cory...Sorry if I've been a little...uh..."

"Jealous?" Eden finishes for him.

Dad glances at Gracie. "I understand," he says. Mom explained to Gracie once that Dad was a little envious of the bond she had with her godfather because of firearms, that Dad had always wanted to be able to share his love of fooball with his own kids, but neither one had shown much interest.

"Thanks for talking to Cory last week," Dan tells Dad. "I think what you said…it made a difference, you know."

Dad half nods. "He'll find a way to bond with team and still be himself. He's just been a little bit of an outsider, and I think at first they thought I was showing him favoritism, making him QB1 just because he's my godson. But then they saw him play. And he leads without arrogance. It'll be a'ight."

Gracie's phone buzzes, and she grabs it eagerly. From under the table, she reads, "Sorry. I was in an evening class."

She texts back: "For THREE hours? And, hello, I said I miss you. Don't you miss me?!"

Cory returns and slides into the chair next to Gracie, and they all lean back from the table as the waitress positions their pizzas on the stands. "So where's your next match?" Cory asks her.

"Up near Allentown. It's a new team. But they're supposed to be really good."

"Well, you'll beat 'em."

By now Dad's divvied out the first slices of pizza. Everyone but Gracie digs in.

Gracie flips her phone over the moment it buzzes. The text from Paul reads: "We need to talk. Call me tonight."

"Eat," Dad says, pointing to her untouched pizza.

"I'm not very hungry." Gracie hopes the hitch in her voice isn't noticeable, but by the concerned way Cory looks at her, she guesses it is.

**/FNL/**

Gracie waits until she's alone and her bedroom door is locked and her blinds are drawn to call Paul. Her stomach feels like a hollow, famished pit that's eating itself.

He builds up to it slowly, gradually. There's plenty of time for the tears to start pooling in her eyes.

"Is it because you found someone else who will put out?" she says bitterly.

"There's no one else, Gracie."

"Sure," she spits. "Sure there isn't."

"Well, not in the way that you mean anyway."

"Oh, in what way then? I'm so glad we didn't do it! You'd probably have dumped me even if we did!"

"Gracie, please. I don't want to hurt you. This wasn't an easy decision for me. At all. I care about you."

"Yeah, you care about getting some."

"That isn't it. And there isn't any other girl."

"Then why?"

"I think maybe I got the call."

"_What_ call?"

"_The_ call."

"From who?"

"God."

Gracie's silent for a long time. "You mean…"

"- I think I want to be a priest."

"Well I'll be damned."

"Nah. Even Protestants can be saved."

Gracie laughs instinctively. She can almost hear Paul smiling on the other end of the line. "But I _love_ you," she says, the laugh turning into a choke. "And we, we almost…"

"I know. But when you put the brakes on, it really forced me stop and think about the direction I was heading in, about what I thought I wanted and why I wanted it and what I really want and what my priorities are and…well…you saying no at the last minute like that…it frustrated me at first, for the obvious reasons, but then I started feeling a different kind of frustration, at myself, because I realized I'd been ignoring all these hints…that my heart's been pulled in two directions…and…I don't know. Your no. It was like a road sign from God or something."

"A road sign? From God?" She doesn't know whether to snicker or cry.

"And I'm so glad you said no. Ever since that night, there's just been whisper after whisper…the things I've been going through since I came to college…" He tells her about his spiritual journey.

"But you didn't tell me any of this the last time we were together."

"I _tried_. But you seemed so…glad to see me."

"Because I _was_ glad to see you!" she half sobs. "And I thought you were glad to see me too."

"I was. I was, it's just…I'm sorry. But this is what I think God is calling me to do. I'm going to transfer to a seminary next semester. And I'm not supposed to have a romantic relationship while I'm trying to discern my vocation."

"But next semester's not for another five months! Why are you breaking up with me now?" Gracie doesn't consider the logic of what she's saying. She just knows she's upset.

"It wouldn't be fair to you to keep dating you. To string you on like that. It'll only be harder to break up five months from now."

"You know for sure you're going to be a priest?"

"I don't know for _sure_. But I _think_ I will. And because I _might_...Gracie, you need to move on while I'm trying to figure all this out."

She can't respond to this, so she just cries.

The last things he says, in a soft mutter, just before he hangs up, is "I'm sorry I hurt you."

When Gracie hangs up, she has a good, long cry. Paul is her first real boyfriend, her first love, her first heartbreak.


	22. Chapter 22

**Chapter 22**

"You okay, peanut?" Dad asks Gracie the next morning when he puts a plate of bacon and eggs in front of her at the table in the kitchen nook. "You didn't really eat last night, and your mama…she though she heard you crying."

Mom knocked on her door last night and whispered her name, but Gracie pretended to be asleep and didn't respond. Now that her tear ducts are dried out, though, she manages to tell Dad about Paul breaking up with her and his reason for doing so.

"Well," Dad says. "At least it's God and not a girl. You can't have an inferiority complex that way."

"Not helpful."

"Then how's about my specialty pancakes? I can put in some of those Georgia pecans I picked up when we were at Nationals."

Dad's clueless, but Gracie smiles anyway. She can't help it. Maybe it's his cluelessness that's making her smile. "At least there's one guy I can always count on to be there for me."

"Well, you've got Dan too," Dad reminds her. "And Matt. And O. You've got a lot of guys in your corner. And of course Cory." He plucks a piece of bacon from the plate he gave her. "You can't forget Cory."

**/FNL/**

In the late morning, Cory calls her and asks if she's coming to the range. "My Dad and I have been here for an hour. I won't be here much longer. I need to practice for that mental math competition." Cory competes in a Philadelphia County-wide competition of the top twenty math brainiacs. They figure out complex mathematical equations in their heads on stage, and the first one to spew out the correct answer gets a point. It's fun to watch at first, in a fascinating, freak show kind of way, and then it gets boring fast, but Gracie's always gone to see him anyway. Cory came in second place last year.

"I'm not coming today. I'm not feeling well."

"Yeah, I noticed you didn't eat last night. Stomach bug? Or…is something else wrong?"

"I just don't feel well," she says. She doesn't want to tell him she broke up with Paul because she's afraid it might look like she's putting out an _Open For Business_ sign.

"Well, if you ever need to talk to me, you know…I'm always around, Gracie."

"I know."

**/FNL/**

Later that night, Sandra takes Gracie out to the make-your-own sundae bar and helps her drown her misery in sugar. O tags along too, because he's always with Sandra these days, and he insists that Gracie put hot fudge on top of the caramel and load it up with extra Reese's.

"Oh my God," Gracie says as she shoves her spoon into her dwindling mountain of candy-covered ice cream, "I just thought of something. Can you imagine how many women will go to church if _Paul's_ the priest?"

Sandra giggles too. "And then they'll all have to go to confession immediately after mass to be absolved of their impure thoughts."

"Hey," O says, looking at Sandra accusingly, "Hey, you're not supposed to have impure thoughts about anyone but _me_."

Sandra wiggles her eyebrow. "I have lots of impure thoughts about you."

"Guys," – Gracie throws up her hands – "not in front of me. Besides, this is my night. This is Gracie's wallow in misery and get over Paul night." She points at herself. "All attention on _me_."

O stands up. "I'm getting you hot chocolate to go with that."

When he returns, Gracie says, "It's awful. It's like if a guy tells you he's gay, and you wonder – did _I_ turn him?"

"First of all," O says, "I don't think you can turn people. Second of all, being celibate is not the same thing as being gay."

Sandra nods. "Just ask Tommy."

O pushes the hot chocolate a little closer to Gracie. "I can't," she says. "I already feel like I'm going to explode."

They practically roll her to the car.

"Don't tell Cory Paul and I broke up," she says to O when he starts driving. "I don't want him to know. I think it'll make things weirder if he knows I'm free."

"Ah, Gracie girl, he was in love with you long before Paul, and he never made a move. He won't. Don't worry. He knows how you feel. He's not going to make a fool of himself by coming on to you. He already feels like a fool for putting his heart on his sleeve and telling you at all."

"I know, but…"

"- It won't raise his hopes any," O insists. "He never had any hope. And he's _going_ to find out. If not from me, then from your Dad. You can't keep secrets in a family."

"Yeah," Gracie sighs. "Exactly. In a _family_. Tell that to Cory."

O shakes his head and makes a turn.

**/FNL/**

The Yankees win the next game of the season. At the last minute, Cory throws the winning touchdown pass. Gracie clambers down the bleachers to congratulate him, but she's beaten to him by that same red-headed cheerleader who asked him if he was going to the party last week. The girl squeals and throws herself at him, and he catches her in his arms. She kisses him squarely on the lips, and Cory looks half flattered, half confused.

At the range on Saturday, when they're on "the talking space," Gracie asks him, "So, are you dating that cheerleader? The red head?"

"No," he says. "But…she likes me."

"_Obviously_."

He smiles. "Yeah."

"She's good-looking. If you like girls with huge tits. Which I understand most guys don't, but you'd probably be willing to make an exception, right?"

Cory chuckles. "I love that you're sarcastic. So many girls are…boring." Gracie looks down at her pop can. As she starts to raise it to her lips, Cory breaks the awkward silence. "And she says anytime I want to hook up with her, you know, casual like, I can."

The Diet Dr. Pepper burns and splutters down Gracie's throat and she coughs in the aftermath. She _hears_ about this all the time - the no-strings-attached exchange of sexual favors – and then both parties go to school the next day as if nothing happened. She puts her mostly empty can down on the ground. "But _you_ don't do that," she says.

He shrugs. "I don't know. I'm thinking of taking her up on the offer. I'm almost 18. And I still haven't…" He takes a sip of his Diet Red Power and doesn't finish his sentence.

He can't _really_ be considering it, can he? "What exactly do you mean by _hook up_?" It's a term that encompasses a lot of possibilities. Maybe he's just talking about kissing a little?

"She said she'd do oral to start. Then maybe next time, a total hook-up."

"_Already_?" He hasn't even taken this girl on a single date.

"Hey, you did it with Paul."

"I was _dating_ him. We had a _relationship_. And, yeah, maybe I did move a little fast on the third date, but it was our _third_ date, we were dating, and I wasn't going to go that far." In truth, she has no idea how far she would have gone if Paul hadn't slid her off his lap. "I don't think I was anyway. And, as a mater of fact, we **_never_ **went that far. The most we ever did was…you know…we just drumped."

("In my day," Julie said once, "we called it dry humping." And Gracie: "Well in my day, we invented the contraction.")

Cory looks puzzled. "I thought you two had sex. Like, _sex sex_."

"O didn't tell you?" Gracie long ago told Sandra about the non-night with Paul, and she just figured Sandra told O and O told Cory.

Cory shakes his head. "Your Dad told me you broke up last week, but I thought before Paul went to college, you two…you know."

"I decided not to do it. And I'm glad, now. You were right. I would have regretted it. And Paul _really_ would have regretted it. He's becoming a priest. I guess my dad told you that too though." Since Dad is apparently in the business of dispensing information to Cory about her love life.

Cory looks down at his pop, which he's rested on the rock between his legs.

"Listen," Gracie says, "you told me I'd regret it, and you were right. So let me tell you something – you're going to regret it if you just randomly hook up with this cheerleader chick."

He drums the side of his pop can with his fingers.

"It's your call of course. I just…I think it's kind of shallow. If you aren't planning to date her. And you used to say you thought the whole hook-up culture was disrespectful to girls."

"She _wants_ to do it. I didn't _suggest_ it. _She_ suggested it."

"I know, but you used to say – "

"- I used to be fourteen. I used to not be on a football team where I was one of only three virgins. I used to think I'd be great friends with the girl first, and then we'd date for a while, and then it would all happen so gradually and perfectly and seamlessly." He swallows, like there's something stuck in his throat. "But I don't think that's gonna happen anymore, Gracie. I don't think that's how the world works. I think you just…you take what you can get when you can get it and where you can get it. And then you move on. Before it costs you too much."

"That doesn't sound like you, Cory."

"Maybe you don't know me as well as you think you do."

"I…" She closes her mouth. She looks out at the range, where they've left their rifles on the loading benches. In the far distance, Dan is tinkering. "I _do_ know you," she says softly. "I _do_."

"Yeah. Like your own brother." He slides off the rock and begins making his way back to the range.


	23. Chapter 23

**Chapter 23**

Gracie misses being able to pop into Dad's office in the middle of the school day. Now that he's at Grant, and it's football season, she feels like catching a minute alone with him is almost impossible. But tonight Mom is at a seminar, and she can hear the game film running in his office, which is attached like a den to the master bedroom. She knocks on the bedroom door.

"Yeah?" he hollers.

She opens it and walks into the den, where he's sitting at his desk and taking notes. He still uses a yellow legal pad, even though all the other coaches use iPads.

"Hey, peanut, have a seat." He motions to the armchair in the corner of the den, pauses the game film, and swivels his desk chair so he's facing her.

"I'm worried about Cory."

"Elaborate."

She fidgets with the necklace Cory gave her, running a fingertip over the gently curved, delicate brass. "I think he's going to do something foolish."

"Cory?" He laughs. "Cory doesn't do foolish." He pauses. "At least not often, and not for long."

"I think he's gonna hook up with this cheerleader. I mean not just hook up, but _**hook up**_."

"I'm sure he'll…uh…" Dad looks to the side, clearly uncomfortable with this conversation, "use…protection."

She rolls her eyes up to the ceiling. His overhead light is really bright. It must be, because her eyes are starting to tear. "He doesn't even love her!"

"Ah. "

"How could he just hook up with some chick he isn't even really dating? I mean he's not even dating her! They're just gonna – you know – majorly casual."

"Ah. Yeah. Well. Cory's a…young man…with…uh…"

"Why are you defending him!"

"I, uh – "

"- I mean you'd so hate it if I did that! If I just was like, to some guy, if I was just like, _sure_, I'll _blow_ you! And then you can reciprocate in a couple of weeks! Otherwise we'll just say hi in the halls!"

Dad flushes a beet red.

"So why is it okay if he does it, but it's not okay if I do it?"

Dad lowers his face to his hands and rubs. "Okay, Gracie, first of all, I didn't _say_ it was _okay_ if he does it." His voice becomes less muffled as he raises his head to look at her. "Second of all, you're my daughter. _**My**_ daughter. My _**daughter**_."

"And he's your godson."

"Not the same thing."

"Because of the _god_ part, or because of the _son_ part?"

"I don't want to have some fight with you about double standards, Gracie. But I think you need to ask yourself why you're so upset about this."

"What do you mean, why I'm so upset? Because it's so casual and meaningless! Because Cory's not that kind of guy!"

"Because it makes you think less of him?"

"I guess."

"And you respect him?"

"Yes." She pulls her legs up now until her sock-clad feet are in the chair. She wraps her arms around her legs.

"And you have some fantasy of him. As the perfect boy. The big brother you look up to."

"He's only a few months older than me."

"Yeah, but you get my point," Dad says.

She turns her head so her cheek is on her knees. "I guess."

"Well Cory's not the perfect boy. He's a good kid, but he's not the _perfect_ boy. And because he's a bit of brainy, quiet type, he's not been real popular with girls most of his high school years. Football has sort of," Dad moves his hands like a catapult. "And he's human."

Gracie straightens her neck and switches to an Indian style position within the chair.

"And, Gracie, when a girl wants...uh...aside from the other…uh…_obvious _feeling…it's also flattering, when you're feeling…_unwanted_…for…uh…"

"Can you just be direct, Dad?"

"I think by now you know Cory loves you. Right?"

She tugs on her brass pendant and flips it over around the black rope. "Yeah. I've known since Nationals."

"Yeah. Mom and I thought maybe he told you. The way y'all were acting after that." He crosses his arms over his chest. "Listen, Gracie. You can't have your cake and eat it too."

"_Directness_, Dad. No metaphors please."

"A'ight then. You want directness? You can't decline to reciprocate Cory's feelings and yet _still_ expect him not to respond to some other girl. It isn't realistic. And it's selfish."

Gracie lets Dad's words sink in. She doesn't reply because she knows he's right, that what she wants, what she really wants, is to have Cory all to herself without having to be more than friends with him. And for years she's had just that. But she can't have it forever. She's been a kind of miser, like in that boring _Silas Marner_ book she was forced to read in English this year, hoarding Cory's attentions like money, neither cashing them in nor giving them away.

Air whispers in at out of her nose as she tries to stop the flood of tears that's about to start. When it starts, it starts quietly. There's only the breathing and the tears. Dad just sits there and waits for her to get it under control. He doesn't try to hug her, because somehow he must know she doesn't want to be hugged.

She draws in one long sniffle. He reaches behind himself and snaps up the Kleenex box with one hand and passes it to her. When she's done wiping her nose, and tossing three or four balled tissues into his office trashcan, he says, "Gracie, have you ever considered just trying? You know, go out on a date with Cory, to some place that's _**not**_ the range. Have a sit down dinner. Hold hands. Maybe….I don't know…dance? Just…_try it_, and see if, eventually, the feeling doesn't follow."

"I just…I can't think of him like that."

"Maybe not now, but maybe….you know…" He puts his hands flat on his legs above his knees and taps once. "New feelings can develop over time. Sometimes you learn to love another person."

She snorts. "It doesn't work like that."

"How _does_ it work, Gracie? Randomly hooking up? Does that _work_? Dating some guy who's having a secret love affair with God? Does that _work_?"

She plucks another tissue out of the box that's in her lap and wipes one last dribble from her nose. "No."

"Listen. It can happen. You can date someone you think of as a friend and still fall in love. I'm not saying it _will_ happen, I'm just saying it _can_. It happened that way with me and your mom."

Gracie's head jerks up. "Really?" When he nods, she says, "So what then? You weren't into Mom at first, and then you dated her and were suddenly into her?"

A laugh erupts from somewhere within him.

"What's so funny?"

"It was the other way around."

"Oh."

"I pestered her so much for a date that she finally said yes just to shut me up. She told me I had three dates and three kisses and then I had to settle for friendship." He smiles. "Well, third time's a charm." He puts a hand on the arm of his chair. "We've had our ups and downs, me and your mom. There are times in our marriage when I've been chasing her, and times when she's been chasing me; times when we've been running toward each other, times when we've been running _from_ each other, and times when we've just been comfortable with each other. Just plain _comfortable_. You're so young, Gracie. You want it to be like some…storybook. Some jolt of electricity. And sometimes it starts like that. But even when it does…it doesn't _stay_ like that. Not _all_ the time. I'm not saying there doesn't need to be some kind of chemistry there. Obviously there has to be attraction. But it's not the only thing. You've known Cory so long, maybe, at the moment, you just can't see the forest for the trees."

"Or maybe that dog won't hunt."

Dad chuckles. "A'ight. All I'm saying is, maybe you should give it a go with Cory. Try dating him. See what happens."

"But what if I never feel anything? And then I have to call it off because I don't? And then I break his heart!"

Dad smiles. It's a strange, sad, affectionate smile. "Gracie, honey, you've _already_ broken his heart."


	24. Chapter 24

**Chapter 24**

Once in her bedroom, Gracie calls Julie to ask her opinion on dating Cory. In the background, Matt is muttering a complaint: _always_ _dragging_, _Henry_, _brushes_, and _all over _are the only words Gracie can make out.

"Dad is advising you to ask a boy on a date? Do you have a different father than I had growing up?"

"No. We have the same father, Julie. "

"Maybe Dad's changed a lot the past fourteen years."

"Probably not as much as you think."

Matt says in the background, "I'm going to my studio."

"Check on Henry first." Julie's voice is muffled. "I thought I heard him calling for me." Then her voice is clear again, "Well, Dad likes Cory. He's probably just more comfortable with you dating someone he's comfortable with. Someone who knows how to play football. I mean, I know he'd rather I have been with Matt than the Swede or the Habitat Guy or the T.A."

"Is Matt the only boyfriend you've ever had who has a name?"

"He's the only one worth referring to by name. Well, the Habitat Guy wasn't bad. He was a good guy, really. He just wasn't _my_ guy. The Swede and the T.A., though, I don't know what I was thinking. But you know, when I was going after the Swede…I already had the guy I was going to spend the rest of my life with, and I think I was just confused because I thought there had to be more." Julie pauses, as if Gracie's supposed to infer something from her words.

When Gracie doesn't respond, Julie continues, "Dad was actually pretty cool about it all, now that I think of it. He told me if I didn't want to be with Matt, I didn't have to go after some other guy as an excuse, that no one would love me any less if I broke up with Matt. So let me tell you that, Gracie – Dad may be team Cory right now, but that doesn't mean he's going to love you any less if you don't date him. No one will love you any less if you choose not to go out with Cory. "

"Except Cory." Gracie turns on her side and glances at the posters on her wall: a Smith and Weston one; the classic Winchester poster, with the cowboy on horseback; the Colt logo, in a circle, and a retro, 50's Daisy air rifle poster, with the redheaded boy. Redheaded, like the girl Cory's probably going to hook up with.

"Gracie…are you sure you don't have feelings for Cory that aren't platonic?"

"Julie, I've known him forever. We practically grew up together. He's _Cory_. I don't know how he can be in love with me. He's my best friend, sure, but – "

"- Well, you know, I married my best friend."

"Yeah, but Matt wasn't your best friend when you started _dating_ him. He _became_ your best friend."

"You have a point," Julie says. "And what can you do? Sometimes the chemistry just isn't there. Even if the guy is great. Like with Landry and Tyra."

"Who? That woman who married that Tim Riggins guy?"

"Never mind. I can't tell you what to do, Gracie. But which are you more likely to regret later – trying or not trying?"

When Gracie later hangs up the phone, she sits up on her bed and slides off the necklace Cory gave her. She opens the top drawer of her nightstand, and a few stray bullets roll around. She finds them in her pockets sometimes and tosses them in there. She doesn't have a jewelry box, because she's never been much of a girly girl. She lays the necklace down next to the box that contains Paul's, which she doesn't wear anymore, because it has that stupid heart pendant, and she doesn't have his heart.

Gracie hasn't spoken to Paul since the break-up. She wonders how he's doing, if they'll ever be friends again, if they were ever really friends in the first place. Was it all ungrounded electricity? She wonders how she could have had that kind of chemistry with someone who wants to be celibate for the rest of his life.

Gracie picks up her cell phone again and calls Paul. This time he answers more readily than he did when they were officially dating. of course, it's late, after eleven, and Paul's not likely to be out partying. "Hey, Gracie," he says, and there's a nervous trimmer in his voice, like maybe he's expecting a fight.

"Hey, can I ask you something?"

"Sure."

"Do you really like Billy Collins? Or did you just see that book on the hutch and say you did, and then go look up some of his poems after our first date?"

"Does it matter now?"

"It does to me."

"I…I was trying to relate to you, Gracie. I was attracted to you and…I was trying so hard to talk to you, and you were giving me one and two word answers, and I thought…"

"Seriously?" She flops onto her back, lengthwise across the bed.

"But I actually _do_ like him now. I've read all his poetry collections now. You introduced me, you know. I like a lot of poetry now. It's kind of a spiritual experience, even the secular poetry. There's something majorly spiritual about verse. A good part of the Bible is poetry. The Psalms, Ecclesiastes, the creation story in Genesis, parts of – "

"- I don't want to talk about religion."

"Okay." There's a prolonged silence. "Why did you call?"

"I don't know. Why don't Catholics just let their priests date and get married? It doesn't make any sense. How are you supposed to counsel married people as a celibate priest?"

"Gracie, I can give you a dozen theological and practical reasons in defense of the celibacy of the priesthood, but I'm guessing you don't really want to hear them."

"Yeah. I don't."

He sighs. "There are all kinds of love. I have to learn to fill my life with agape love instead of with eros."

There he goes again with the terminology. "Cory's in love with me." She's not entirely sure why she says this. The petty part of her just wants to make him jealous. The more mature part of her hopes he has some wisdom to share.

"Yeah. I tried to tell you that. At your birthday party. It was pretty obvious to me." She doesn't tell him she already knew at that point. "I was majorly jealous. But I also…I don't know. There was a lot going on in my head. I could tell you preferred his gift to mine. And I wondered if maybe we didn't know each other very well, you and I. But I pushed that fear away because…at that time, I was just thinking about getting you in my bed. I got my priorities all jumbled up."

"I'm trying to decide whether or not I want to go out with him. I don't know if I can ever love him the way he loves me."

"You feel philia and storge but not eros."

"Enough with the Greek. Philia I'm guessing is brotherly love?" She lives the city of brotherly love, after all. "And eros is erotic, obviously. What's storge?"

"I guess affection is the closest way of putting it."

"Yeah, okay," she says. "That's about the sum of it. So…my dad thinks I should date him."

"Your dad never did like me."

"Yes he did. He told me he thought you were a decent guy and that you treated me well." Before he told her Paul wasn't the one, of course. Gracie stands up and pulls down the covers. "So…do you think I should?" There's still that small part of her clamoring, _Make him jealous, make him jealous_. "Date Cory I mean?"

"I don't think it's really fair to him. If a guy's dating a girl, he wants to be desired by her. On the other hand, relationships don't last long if they only have eros as the foundation, and you already love him in other important ways. And he's obviously attracted to you. And maybe in a different setting and circumstance, you could get past the familiarity."

"So no…but yes?"

"I can't tell you what to do, Gracie. I just hope you're happy. That's all."

"Thanks," she mutters as she pulls off her socks and tosses them into the laundry basket in her open closet.

"Gracie, _are _you happy when you're with Cory?"

**/FNL/**

"Cory?" The cell phone presses against Gracie's ear. She's in her flannel camo PJs now, curled tightly beneath the blankets, with nothing but the street light filtering in through the blinds. "Did I wake you?"

"Nah. I was doing some math."

"Homework?"

"No. Just some math."

"It's after midnight."

"It's relaxing."

Gracie laughs. "I bet the redhead doesn't know you do math for fun."

"She _likes_ me," he says tightly. "Don't tell her."

"I didn't mean it as a threat! How would I tell her? I don't even know her. I just meant I know something about you that's kind of strange and cute, and she…she doesn't know _anything_ about you."

He sighs. "Gracie, I haven't hooked up with her yet. But she _likes_ me. And I don't see why I shouldn't. What do you want anyway? Why are you calling me after midnight?"

She closes her eyes. "I just…I was wondering. Would you like to go out with me? On a…you know…_date_?" She has to say "Cory?" because he doesn't answer.

"So…uh…you don't think of me as a brother anymore?"

"I _do_…but….maybe after a while I won't?" He's quiet for a long time. "Cory, I can't promise anything. I'm not promising anything. But if you'd like to give it a try, I'd like to give it a try. See what happens."

He's silent for so long she's afraid he's going to say no and just take the red bird in hand rather than bothering with beating her bush. Oh, God. Now she's thinking in metaphors too. And that one kind of had a vulgar double meaning. She laughs.

"See, you can't even think of dating me without laughing about it."

"I wasn't laughing about it. I was laughing about a random thought I had. Cory? Please? Three dates? Let's just try three dates. If there's nothing at all there, then…okay. I promise I'll shut up about you and the redhead and I won't try to talk you out of hooking up with her."

"She has a name. It's Kimberly."

"Oh God. Of course it is. So are you going to go out with me or what?"

"I don't know," he says. "It depends." He pauses, the way he does for dramatic effect when he's about to be a smart ass. "Do I have to meet your father first?"

Gracie nearly rolls off the bed laughing.


	25. Chapter 25

**Chapter 25**

Gracie lays down on her bedroom floor and puts her ear to the air conditioning vent. She can hear the chairs scrapping back against the hard wood floor of the dining room below.

"You know you've got to do a better job next time of determining whether or not your receiver has leverage," Dad says.

"Yes, sir, I realize that," Cory replies.

"Because I don't want another loss like the one we had last night."

"Neither do I. Not cleaning your guns tonight?"

"They don't really need it."

"You hear that, Gracie?" Cory must be shouting up toward the ceiling, where the air conditioning event is located. "He doesn't feel the need."

"Yeah, I heard," she calls through the vent and then stands.

When she's in the dining room, she smooths her skirt. Dad smiles softly.

Cory swallows. He looks surprisingly nervous. She's a little nervous too. This is…just weird.

"Y'all have a good time," Dad says. "Have her home by ten thirty."

"Yes, sir."

Cory takes her to the same gourmet pizza place Paul took her on their first date, though of course Gracie doesn't mention that. It's a common first date joint. Not quite as low brow as regular pizza, but not too fancy or expensive either. When they're in the booth and looking at their menus, Malcolm slides in next to Gracie. "Whaz up, blokes?"

Cory puts down the menu and glares at him. "Malcolm. What are you doing here?"

"Just came to order some take out but saw you two and figured I'd just join you instead." He points to one of the stands with a picture of a garlic and tomato pizza. "You want to share that one?"

"Ummm…bloke," Cory says, "We're on a date here."

Malcolm laughs. It's a loud, long laugh, but eventually it trails off. "A date," he mutters. "That's a good one." He turns to the waiter that has just arrived. "Pitcher of Red Power for the table," he says.

Gracie looks at Cory, smiles, and shrugs. Cory sighs and slumps downward in the booth.

**/FNL/**

"Siri, shut off!" Dad shouts when Gracie comes into the living room less than two hours after leaving. The wall goes blank. "That was a short date."

She plops down on the couch. She figures it's been sanitized by now. "Mom's not back from her seminar?"

"Not yet." He rises from his recliner and comes and sits on the middle cushion next to her, setting his beer bottle down on the coffee table. "So, why so short? Didn't go well?"

"Malcolm, you know, from Grant's rifle team? He sort of joined us. We had fun, but…it didn't really turn out to be a date. So we're going to try again next Saturday. "

"You couldn't tell Malcolm to get lost?"

"We tired. Twice. It didn't work." She puts her feet up on the coffee table. "Hey, can I ask you something? Back on the way to Atlanta, when you said you didn't think Paul was the one, why did you say that? Was it because you somehow knew he was going to become a priest?"

"Nah," he says, reaching for his beer. "That came out of left field for me too. I just didn't want you to have sex with him."

"So you lied?"

"Not exactly." He sips his beer and sets it back down. "Paul was too idealistic for you, Gracie. Too soft. You're like your mother. You need a man who's tough and realistic."

"What nonsense. Eric, you are a capital-r Romantic."

They both look back at Mom in surprise. Neither of them heard the front door open and close. Mom tosses her purse and car keys on the end table and sits on the other side of Dad. "You can't do what you've done with some of these boys – Tim, Matt, Vince, Max, Terrance – and not be a Romantic."

"You're also major softie," Gracie says, "whether you think you are or not."

Dad stretches an arm out on both sides of the couch and lets a hand drop on Gracie right shoulder and the other on Mom's left one. "Only when it comes to the girls in my life. Not in _general_."

Gracie smiles and lays her head on his shoulder. "What's on the iWanderer? Did you record Master Marksman for me?"

"No," Mom says, "I think we ought to make this an impromptu family movie night."

"My turn to choose," Dad insists. "_Remember the Titans_. But the original one, with Denzel Washington, Not the 2018 remake."

Mom and Gracie glance at each other across Dad and smile. "Majorly unromantic," Gracie says.

"Hard as nails," Mom agrees.

Gracie didn't sleep well Friday night, and she's about to nod off an hour into the movie. She excuses herself, heads upstairs, and crawls into bed. Her parents' voices drift from the living room to the dining room and up through the air conditioning vent. She hears only bits and pieces, starting with Mom: "…date…Cory…"

"…Malcolm…and Cory just…"

"…even try to kiss her?…"

"...I don't know, Tami, but I think…afraid…risking…Cory's too…can't just wait for her to…boy's got to…like Matt…that damn Swede…just stood by and let…"

"…be as dogged as you, Eric…"

"…come on, you loved it…overcome, baby, slain by my irresistible…"

"…just _gave in_ finally…"

"Oh really…lifelong shackle…easier…"

Mom, laughing, "You know…until I realized…possible to lose your heart…for granted…and now…all the years…feel…."

"…nah, babe, I'm the lucky one…"

The voices murmur like a fan as Gracie drifts off to sleep.

**/FNL/**

The next Saturday Gracie and Cory go to an Italian place, but the same thing happens. Tommy and his boyfriend Roger sit down at the table with them. Cory tries to explain that they'd like their privacy, but Tommy snickers and then starts telling Cory about how Pemberton Rifle is a shoe-in for Nationals now that Cory isn't on Grant Rifle anymore. The conversation flows from there, and Tommy and Roger don't leave the table all evening.

On the drive home, Cory is tense. "I guess there's no point in trying this," he says. "No one takes it seriously. How can you?"

"Hey – I promised you three dates. So let's try one more."

He sighs.

"Why don't you come to my house next Saturday night?" Gracie says. "I'll fix dinner for you. Or we can fix it together. You like cooking."

"Because it's kind of like chemistry."

"Then no one will try to join us."

Dad plans to take Mom out on a date night so Cory and Gracie can have the place to themselves. When Gracie calls Julie two hours before the date and tells her Mom and Dad are clearing out so she can have Cory over, Julie says, "Dad is **not** intentionally leaving you alone in the house with a boy."

"He is," Gracie assures her.

"He must really think Cory doesn't stand a chance." She pauses to tell Henry to stop floating his carrots in his milk. "_Does_ he stand a chance?"

"Of what?"

"Of you making out with him tonight?"

"I don't know," Gracie says honestly. "I really don't know."

"Well I want a full report tomorrow morning. We'll do a post-game dissection."

"I told you we had the same father."


	26. Chapter 26

**Chapter 26**

As Cory and Gracie cook dinner together, they talk and laugh and make a huge mess. After they eat, they clean up the kitchen. To aid their labor, they make an impromptu playlist of their favorite songs and crank up the iStereo. Gracie's choices include an irregular smattering of heavy metal, modern folk, and oldies ("Oldies?" Julie said once on a family beach vacation. "They were playing that song when _**I**_ was in junior high! That can't be on the oldies station!"). Cory's choices include mostly blues, ska, and big band.

It's great fun, but Gracie always has great fun with Cory. It's not as though she feels like ripping off his clothes. Yet she does study him a little more than usual. She notes that his eyes, to which she's grown accustomed, really are the most unusual shade of brown and green, and his skin is such a perfect blend of white and black.

A swingy jazz number comes up on the playlist they made. Cory leans the broom against the counter, smiles, and holds out a hand. "May I have this dance?" He has a cute smile, slightly crooked.

She looks around the kitchen. "There's not enough room. I'm clumsy. I'm going to hit that table."

Cory moves the table flush against the window in the breakfast nook, grabs her hand again, and pulls her to the center of the floor. They cover nearly every tile as they whirl around the kitchen, but Gracie has two left feet, and they give up in laughter. Gracie, still giggling, leans against the counter. He puts an arm around her waist, tugs her from the cabinets, and kisses her.

There's no sudden flash of desire and warmth, the way there was with Paul, but it's pleasant. More pleasant than any of the half dozen other goodnight kisses she's had. She doesn't mind that it ends, but she doesn't mind when he's kissing her either.

"So?" he asks, his voice a medley of hope and anxiety.

"It was nice," she says.

"Nice," he echoes. His arms slide from her waist. "Nice."

"Hey, trust me, nice is _way_ above average."

He steps back. "I don't want be nice, Gracie."

"What's wrong with nice?"

"I want to excite you."

She looks at the tiled floor.

"You should…" His voice is thick. "You should really date someone who excites you. Thanks for trying though. I appreciate…you know…not just writing me off." He walks out of the kitchen, through the dining room, and into the living room. He grabs his brown leather jacket from off the back of the couch where he laid it earlier.

"Wait!" she says as she trails after him. "Are you…" Now her voice is thick too. "Are you going to hook up with Kimberley then?"

"I don't know."

"I _really_ don't want you to."

He turns to face her. "_Why?_"

"I don't know. I really don't know." She tries not to cry. She's not a crier usually, but lately…she slides down on the couch.

Cory sits next to her, tosses his jacket on the coffee table, and pulls her close as her tears begin to fall. He kisses her again. They kiss for a while, and it feels….she can't describe how it feels. It's not what she expects romantic love to feel like. But it's not what she expects friendship to feel like either.

"I love you," he says.

"Cory, I love you, too. Somehow."

There's affection and bitterness mixed in the short, low breath of his laugh. "Yeah," he says. "_**Somehow**_." He stands up slowly from the couch and slides on his jacket. "I better be getting home."

"Cory, please. I want to keep trying."

"I don't. I don't want to be something you have to keep trying at."

"Please, I don't want to lose your friendship."

"You won't," he says, looking up at the overhead light, as if it's all he can do to maintain control. He puts a hand on either of his hips and his head falls. "Please don't think you have to…you don't have to do anything to keep my friendship. Just don't talk to me about your next boyfriend, okay? I mean, I know friends usually do that, but…uh…please don't."

Cory lets himself out.

**/FNL/**

"There's nothing to dissect," Gracie says to Julie the next morning. She's sitting on the cobblestone wall outside of church, her coat zipped tight and one glove on the hand that's not holding the phone. Fall has grown cold.

The church service is still going on, but the sermon was tedious this morning because the assistant pastor is preaching, and the guy has no inflection and follows a strict outline all four times a year he's permitted to take the pulpit. So Gracie snuck out to "go to the bathroom." She left Dad behind, sketching play diagrams on the white note pads they keep in the pews, beneath Mom's scolding gaze.

Gracie doesn't mind church usually. The people are nice, she enjoys listening to some of the music, and it pleases her mother to have the family together on a Sunday morning. Her parents don't force her go to youth group, thank God, with the thirty-two-year-old youth pastor in his skinny jeans and graphic t-shirt and cool-guy glasses, desperately trying to "relate" to the teens. She asked Dad once if he'd go to church if he weren't married to Mom, and he said, "Of course. Why wouldn't I?" and Gracie shrugged. Gracie wonders if she'll still go when she's no longer with her parents, or if, like Matt and Julie, she'll simply stop. She supposes it will depend on who she's involved with, and whether or not he wants to go. If he's someone like Paul, she'll be going every week. If he's someone like Cory, who calls himself a "deist" (Dan's a self-proclaimed "agnostic Episcopalian" and Eden refers to herself as a "sometimes Jew"), she'll probably just say grace before meals, pray when she's desperate, and put a tree up for Christmas. But no matter who she dates, and no matter what he believes, she'll be at the range every single Saturday.

"What do you mean?" Julie asks. "So nothing happened?"

"Well, we kissed. And it was just okay. So we decided to stop dating."

"You sound upset. But it was your choice, right?"

"Yeah. Well…I don't know. I said I was willing to keep trying. But he didn't want to. And now he's probably going to hook up with the big-titted red head."

Julie laughs. "Big-titted red head? Is that some kind of tropical bird?"

"It's this cheerleader. O says she's dumb as rocks, but she likes Cory. Well, she thinks he's good-looking. But only because he is. And she just wants to be able to say she did the quarterback. I don't think she _really_ respects him. I don't even think Cory likes her. He just likes being liked by her. I don't know why he would settle for her but say _we_ can't keep dating just because I'm not as into it as he is."

"Well, it's a lot easier on the ego to settle for someone than to be the one settled for."

"I guess." Gracie runs a finger over a crack in the cobblestone. "I'm afraid we won't be as close now, you know? He's my best friend, Julie."

"I know."

Gracie's breath hovers on the air as her father trips down the stairs of the church toward her. His red tie is eschew, crossing his white dress shirt to fall over his black suit coat. He doesn't have an overcoat on, and he's rubbing his bare hands together. It's not usually quite this cold in early November. She tells Julie she has to go and crams the cell phone back in her pocket and pulls on her other glove.

"You need to get back inside," Dad tells her, coming to a stop by the wall. "They're taking up the offering now. Your mom will pitch a fit if you miss communion."

"But they'll do announcements in between. And Pastor Andrews always takes _forever_ with announcements. We've got at least ten minutes."

Dad chuckles and sits on the wall next to her. "I hate it when Reverend Cole is out."

"Me too."

Gracie straightens his tie for him. She knows he's a handsome man, because even though he's over fifty, women in their thirties are always flirting with him at church. He's either oblivious or socially inept or afraid of Mom's reaction, because he only ever responds with an uneasy smile and general silence.

Dad shoves his hands under his armpits to keep them warm. "So how did your date with Cory go? You were already in bed last night when Mom and I got home."

"It was okay, but we've decided we're just going to be good friends."

Dad nods. "A'ight. Got your eye on someone else?"

She rolls her eyes. "If I did, would I tell you?"

"I just need to know if I should get my guns ready to clean for when the next guy comes over." She rolls her eyes yet again, and he bumps her shoulder with his own. "Hey," he says. "You know I've always done that because I thought you wanted to _appear_ to be dating without _actually_ dating. But then you fell for Paul, and it was suddenly real. But now Paul's out of the picture, and…Gracie, you know you don't _have_ to have a boyfriend. You're seventeen. You've got your whole life ahead of you. You don't have to date at all, if you don't want to. Don't worry if people think it's odd that you're not with anyone. Just be yourself."

"Did you want me to go out with Cory just because you're comfortable with him? Just so you could have some control over who I was dating?"

"You're my second teenage daughter. If I learned anything the first time around, it's that I have no control. Influence, maybe, I hope, but not control." He puts a hand lightly on her shoulder. "I wanted you to give Cory a fair shake because I know what it's like to be in his shoes. And…yeah, I am comfortable with Cory. I trust him."

"So am I. That's the problem. Too comfortable."

Dad nods. "Well, just don't rush out to date someone else just to have someone else to date. The right guy will come along. Maybe after law school."

"I don't think I want to go to law school anymore." She hasn't applied for early admission to college anywhere, even though Mom urged her to. Cory applied to U-Penn, and O to some great books college in New York.

"Then after college." He jerks his head toward the church. "Come on. Before your mom comes looking for us."


	27. Chapter 27

**Chapter 27**

If Cory hooks up with Kimberly, he doesn't tell Gracie about it. Gracie tries to get information from O, but O says, "Ask _Cory _if you want to know." She doesn't ask, because she doesn't want to know, not really, not if the answer is yes.

Despite her father's assurance that she doesn't have to date anyone, Gracie accepts a request from a boy here and there. She's not particularly attracted to any of them, and she barely lets them kiss her goodnight. Nothing feels quite like it did with Paul. The kisses don't even feel as good as Cory's did.

She resents Paul for giving her a taste of fire and then leaving her to chase some religious dream. She wonders if she'll ever feel that way again, and then she wonders if what she felt for Paul was all spark and no substance, if she ever really loved him, or if it was just lust.

"I wouldn't question it," her mother tells her when Gracie raises the topic one night. It's their monthly 'girls' night', a sort of mommy-daughter date that Mom has insisted on since Gracie was twelve. Tonight they watched a chick flick at home and ate chocolate-covered popcorn while Dad went out with Dan to some bar. "Your feelings for Paul were sincere," Mom says, "even if they weren't very deep. And your feelings for Cory are sincere, even if they aren't quite the kind that keep you up all night wanting him."

"But how do you find both?" Gracie asks.

"Honestly? I think maybe some people never do. They pick one or the other."

"But you and Dad found both, right?"

"We definitely have the abiding love. The passion comes and goes."

"But since you got married, you've never **not** felt attracted to him, have you?"

Mom tosses back her head when she laughs, and her thick hair cascades over the back of the living room couch. "I wouldn't exactly say that, Gracie Belle. We've been married over thirty years. We've seen each other in many unattractive circumstances and moods."

"You know what I mean, though, right?"

"Your dad and I have chemistry, yes."

"How was it you didn't feel it for Dad at first, but then you did? Was it like a light switch going off?"

"No. It was more gradual than that."

"But on the third date you had chemistry?"

She snorts. "Is that what your father told you?" Gracie nods and Mom says, "I don't think it was the third date. I don't know when it happened, really. I couldn't point to a day or hour. I just kept dating him because he was nice to me, and I didn't have anyone else I wanted to date more at the time. And your father was very persistent."

Cory's not that persistent…well, except when it comes to math and science and firearms and football. Why wasn't he more persistent with her? He never even asked her out. He accepted defeat from the beginning. _She_ suggested dating to begin with, and then when she wasn't falling all over him, _he_ called it off. Maybe he was afraid of losing her friendship if he pushed things. Or maybe he's prouder than her father was. Maybe, like Julie said, it's too much of a blow to the ego to be settled for. Or maybe Cory's just not quite as smitten with her as she thought. She wonders, sometimes, what might have happened if they had kept dating.

The front door opens and closes.

"But I was still having a hard time getting over Mo," Mom continues, "so I couldn't really feel that way for your dad right away. Your father's timing was just awful."

"Who's timing was awful?" Dad asks, entering the living room from the foyer and sliding down on the couch next to Mom. His eyes are rather cheerful.

Mom gives him her famous, accusatory look. "Please tell me Dan drove you home."

"Yes, ma'am," he says. "We'll pick up my car tomorrow. Who's timing was awful?"

"Do you think we have chemistry, sugar?" she asks.

"Biochemistry, babe."

Mom laughs indulgently, and Dad leans in to kiss her. Gracie has to remind them she's there, even though she doesn't mind, not really, because she knows she wants what they have.

**/FNL/**

Dad defies everyone's expectations, including his own, and takes the Grant Yankees to State his first season as head coach. They don't win the championships, but they don't lose as badly as they expect. Gracie is proud of her father and of Cory.

"Want to go out and celebrate with me tomorrow night?" she asks Cory on the sidelines after the game. She figures he's doing something with his football buddies tonight.

"I have other plans tomorrow night," he says.

"Such as…"

Cory shifts his helmet in his hand, and his body sways as he's bumped in all directions by passing players. "Just plans."

He's had too many plans since they stopped dating. She misses him. Misses laughing with him, seeing him, just being around him. She even misses his admiration, the way he'd look at her when they were dating. She doesn't know why she misses that part, because it was awkward. "I'm proud of you," she says. "You played real well out there. I'm sure the scholarship offers are going to roll in now, even though you only played one season."

He looks down at the turf. "Thanks," he mutters, and shrugs. "If not, I'll get an academic scholarship." Then he looks up and away, toward the locker room. "I gotta go."

**/FNL/**

The Taylors go to Chicago for winter break and cram into the three-bedroom apartment that is the best Matt and Julie, in their early thirties, can afford. "Chicago rents," Matt grumbles.

He rents a studio downtown with three other artists and rarely paints at home anymore. Henry is too much of a distraction. After twelve weeks of maternity leave and a year and a half of putting Henry in day care, Julie decided to quit her teaching job and write full-time, but writing doesn't come easily with a preschooler constantly jabbering at you.

Mom and Dad get the guest bedroom, and Gracie bunks with two-year-old Henry ("TWO AND HALF!" he tells her six times that day), who wakes her up in the middle of the first night by crawling into bed with her and mumbling, "Bad dream. Veeeeeeeery bad" and then is up again at six in the morning shouting, "Gracie! Play mounventure earshcrussers wid me!"

"What?" she asks groggily, pulling herself up.

"Mounventure earshcrussers now! You be Drunk Elf."

"Drunk elf?"

Gracie goes to the living room with him and spends the next half hour trying to decode Henry's game plan, until Matt stumbles out and puts on the coffee and tells her Henry is saying "Mountain Adventure Earth Crushers," which is a superhero video game the boy plays daily.

"And Drunk Elf is one of the characters?"

"I don't know anything about Drunk Elf," Matt says, laughing and pouring himself a cup of coffee. "But I don't monitor that stuff. That's Julie's job. I'm teaching him to target shoot at cheerios in the toilet."

Julie yawns her way into the kitchen, kisses Matt, and takes the coffee from his hand that he's already sipped. "Thanks."

Matt just shakes his head in that mild way of his and pours another cup.

Gracie's likes Matt a lot, but she's always thought he was a little too meek. She has trouble imagining him as a quarterback, on a football field, hollering and being all competitive, but they say he was QB1 in high school. Sometimes she thinks Julie rides a little roughshod over him, and that he ought to assert himself more, but she suppose it works for them, that Julie's kind of insecure for all her big sister posturing, and she needs someone like Matt who will take it easy on her.

"Drun_**g**_ Elf," Julie says. "The Land of Drung is an emerald world full of riches and hidden resources, including secret powers."

Henry runs up to the Christmas tree and points to one of the presents Mom and Dad put under it for him. "Drunk Elf carrot-er in there. I know it! But it's too big. So Skyfucker in there too."

"Character," Julie translates. "SkyTrucker. The video games has collectible figurines you have to use when you're playing, and there are thirty of them to collect. It's a total scam. Twenty-five bucks a pop. But they make easy Christmas gifts."

Gracie knows it's not Drunk Elf or Skyfucker, but a set of old-school tinker toys that Mom ordered off of some crazy expensive wooden toy speciality website. "They let that boy play way too many video games," Mom muttered at the airport. "He's not even three!"

"That's why I got him a football," Dad said. He gets Henry a different football for every gift-giving occasion. He started with a plush, furry, stuffed football, then a special, semi-plastic "teething football" you could put in the freezer, then a Neon blue Nerf football, then a Neon _yellow_ Nerf football, but this year, Henry gets a _real_ football, as well as a Youth Extra Small Grant Yankees jersey and cap.

"It's probably another college savings bond," Matt grumbles. "Because of course we can't be trusted to save for our own son's college education."

"Cool it," Julie says. "Don't look a gift horse in the mouth. Besides, it just means more money for wine if we don't have to fund the whole thing ourselves."

"Did somebody say wine?" Mom asks as she emrges in her warm, flannell PJs and stops by the Christmas tree. "It's a little early for wine, but if my son-in-law wants to make me a mimosa, I won't protest."

"Make her two," says Dad from behind her as he puts his hands on her shoulders and rubs. "Then maybe we'll take a little late morning nap."

"Inappropriate!" Gracie and Julie chorus together.


	28. Chapter 28

**Chapter 28**

Christmas morning dawns in a sea of torn paper and excited dancing from Henry, who gets his Drunk Elf from his mother, if not from his feckless grandparents.

Dad chuckles as he watches his grandson, and says, "When you're done playing Whatchacallit Adventures, Henry, we'll toss that football around."

"Where?" Mom asks. "In the city streets?"

"We'll go to a park."

"In December? In Chicago?" Matt asks.

Dad looks around the apartment. "We'll find a way."

"Don't break anything," Julie warns. She turns to Gracie. "So what did Cory give you for Christmas? He always seems to pick the perfect gifts for you."

"An autographed book of poetry. Billy Collins. I don't know where he found it. His mom probably helped." It was very thoughtful of him.

"We've got a special Christmas surprise for you," Julie tells Mom.

Mom claps her hands together and smiles broadly. "I think I know what it is!"

Julie rolls her eyes. "No, Mom. It's not that. I told you, one child is enough for us."

After the last two nights and mornings with Henry, Gracie can see why.

Mom frowns, and Dad gives her a look that says, _Drop it, Tami._

The gift turns out to be a family portrait. Last summer, Mom forced all six of them to go to a photographer, and with Henry climbing up on everything and trying to tackle all of the equipment, it was a bit of a nightmare. Dad made noises about just giving up, but fell silent in the path of Mom's raised eyebrow. Matt rolled his eyes repeatedly but never made a verbal peep of protest. Gracie just shook her head, and Julie was the only one to vocally express her displeasure at the whole affair. Eventually, however, the photographer managed to get a surprisingly decent shot, and Mom had about a hundred wallets made.

"Just get the digital package," Julie kept telling her. "No one carries wallet photos anymore. We all have our photos on our phone." Mom wouldn't hear it.

Matt has used that family photo as a model for the oil painting he now hands Mom. "This is beautiful!" she says. "It's so real, Matt. You did a fantastic job! You could have a business doing this!"

"I do," Matt says. "It's how I supplement our income when my real art isn't selling."

"Come on," Dad says. "This _is_ real art, son. I can tell what it is and everything."

Henry, who has been scribbling on his new sketch pad with his new set of markers holds up a page. "Can you tell what this is?"

"Of course," Dad says as he looks at the wild maze of random circles and squiggles. ``That's life, Henry. And you're full of it."

**/FNL/**

Gracie still hasn't applied for college. She tells Mom she'll apply by the late admission deadlines, that she needs to concentrate on training for the State Rifle Championships, which are being held especially early this year.

Gracie and Cory shoot together weekly, having moved to a supervised, public indoor range for the winter, but she never asks him about Kimberly and he never asks her about boys. While they wait for their lanes – which can sometimes take up to an hour if the range is crowded - they talk about their academic and career goals, guns, books, music, and parents.

Today, when they exit the range to the waiting area, where they always wash their hands and finishing packing up their gear, she happens to notice that, even though the football season is over, he's keeping in good shape. As he flips off the faucet, dries his hands, and heads over to the bench where she's unzipping her bag, it occurs to her that he must be the best-looking math nerd in the nation. A guy as smart and nice and handsome as Cory really deserves better than a series of unattached hook-ups with a stupid, pom-pom wielding slut. Suddenly, she blurts, "Are you hooking up with Kimberley?"

He tosses an empty ammo box in the trashcan next to the bench. "Why do you care?"

"Because you're my friend. And I don't want you to waste yourself on some…Look, she's probably been with a hundred…I just…" Gracie violently throws her ear muffs in her bag.

Cory shuffles around the gear in his bag until he can zip it. "I never hooked up with her."

Relief eases through Gracie's tensed muscles.

"I'm dating someone else anyway. Real dating."

Gracie pauses with her hand on the zipper of her bag. "What?" This was not a development she had foreseen, though she should have. Surely Kimberley's not the only girl interested in Grant's star quarterback. "Who? Is she a senior?"

"She's a freshman."

Gracie looks at him in disbelief. "Really? That _young_?"

"She's a _college_ freshman. I met her few weeks ago when I went to interview for U-Penn. She was at this coffee shop where I stopped in. She was struggling with a Calc II problem, and I helped her. She wants to be an Economics major."

"Oh." A college girl. Also not a development Gracie had foreseen. "So she's smart then?" Smarter than Gracie, probably. A real potential rival for his heart. Gracie should be happy about that, right? If Cory finds someone he can love beside her, then they can be just friends again, no weirdness.

"Yeah, pretty smart."

"Is it…" Gracie doesn't like the way her voice waivers. "Do you love her?"

He laughs. "We've only been dating for a month." Cory slings his bag over his shoulder. "Wanna grab lunch?"

**/FNL/**

Winter thaws early, and it feels almost like spring in late February. Gracie wins a gold medal at State, but Tommy chokes, Sandra just misses the bronze, and Pemberton Rifle loses to Grant. It's her senior year, and Gracie won't get to compete at Nationals again. Nevertheless, she keeps practicing.

One unseasonably warm afternoon in early March, she shows up at Dan's outdoor range, where she's supposed to meet Cory to shoot, but he isn't there, and neither is her godfather.

Annoyed, she calls Cory on her cell, asking, "Where are you guys? You said – "

"- _Gracie..."_

Her heart stops at the choked, desperate way he says her name, almost as if the word is a shudder.

"Gracie…something happened."

A sense of dread, like hard, cold blanket, comes down over her. "Cory?"

"My dad…Gracie…he….he had a heart attack."

"Dan?" Her stomach clenches in on itself. "Is he at the hospital?"

"No. Not anymore."

"They released him?"

"No. Not…He…his…heart…"

Her head is growing dizzy. "Cory?" she asks, the name a plea.

"He died, Gracie. He just…died."


	29. Chapter 29

**Chapter 29 **

The closed-casket funeral falls fast on the heels of Dan's death. The ceremony is held in a memorial home. Mom sticks close to Eden's side throughout the service. Matt and Julie caught a flight the moment they heard the news and barely made it to the funeral. Over the years, they've met Dan several times, even spent some holidays with him, and though they don't know and love him the way Gracie and Dad and Mom do, their eyes are red. Little Henry, dressed in a black suit and tie, clings to Matt's hand, shy and bored and confused. Julie has to take him out when a moth flutters in and catches his fancy and he starts giggling uncontrollably.

Gracie sits on one of the cloth, padded chairs in the back row, her knees tight together, her black dress stiff and uncomfortable. She feels like she wants to throw-up. There's loud, Ethiopian wailing from Eden's parents, who were opposed to the marriage at first, but who apparently came to love Dan, and from Eden's older brother and sister. It's foreign to Gracie, this way of grieving, but it doesn't startle her either, because the sounds recede like the distant roar of an ocean.

As if through a heavy fog, she watches O walk up to the coffin, lay a rose atop it, and then lean against it, his hands on the slick, waxlike wood surface. He heaves. Dad comes up next to him, says something, and O says something back, and they hug and just stand there hugging for a while.

Cory doesn't go near the casket. He stands with his back to his family, to the funeral room, to the chairs, to it all, looking out the window where the green grass grows in a sweeping field to lay a bed for the flowers that spring up wildly and willfully with fresh taunts of new life. Gracie knows what it looks like, because she walked around there for a while, to be alone, before the funeral. They will bury Dan there later, where the freshly dug ground gapes like a hungry mouth.

**/FNL/**

Gracie doesn't eat at the wake at the Harris house. There are so many people she doesn't know. Mom is forcing herself to play the hostess because Eden can't. Her southern charm is turned on to the top setting, and Gracie has no idea how she does it.

Gracie plants herself in a stiff chair in the formal living room and stares at the dark wood bookcase neatly arranged with books by and about Shakespeare, except for the last shelf, which is jammed with Dan's firearms encyclopedias. She used to climb up next to him when she was six and peer over at the pictures.

O comes and stands behind her, a hand on the back of her chair. "I have Sandra," he tells her. "It helps a little. Cory needs someone to talk to."

Her eyes stay fixed on the yellow spine of one of Dan's books. "Why isn't his girlfriend here?"

"Hannah? She broke it off with him a couple weeks ago. Just before Valentine's Day. He didn't tell you?"

Gracie shakes her head.

"She found another guy at college. It's hard, being in two different places like that."

"She should at least be here to support him though, as a friend."

"I don't think Cory wanted her here. They only dated two months. You ought to talk to him, Gracie. He hasn't said a word to either me or Mom for the past day. Not a single word." He puts a hand on her shoulder and she looks up at him. "He'll talk to you."

**/FNL/**

Gracie finds Cory in the basement. He's squatting down by a mini fridge and packing a cooler. He jumps up when he hears her footsteps come off the last stair.

"Oh, it's just you," he says.

"Yeah." She leans against the pool table, her hand resting next to Cory's jacket and tie, which he's tossed on the green surface. "Just me." She swallows. She doesn't know what to say. She looks over into the cooler, and sees it contains beer. He turned eighteen in February. It's legal for him now. "Where are you taking all that?"

"I was thinking of going up to the range. Doing a little shooting."

"While drinking?"

"No. After I shoot, I'll lock up my gun and then…I don't know. Have a couple. Come back when all these people have cleared out. I just need to be alone. I know it's not technically legal to shoot unsupervised, but I'm only a year away. And it used to be eighteen."

"I'm sure Dan will be supervising in spirit."

Cory's lips tremble and his nostrils flare. The sob is guttural. She doesn't know if she should come to him. He looks like he's thrown up a shield of prickles, a "keep off" sign, and she feels so alone herself, so empty, so incapable of comforting anyone. He wipes the white sleeve of his dress shirt across his face roughly and picks up the cooler. As he passes her, he whispers, "I don't really want to be alone. I just don't want to be in this house."

She doesn't say anything, but she follows him out the sliding glass door, up the side yard, through the gate, and to the street where the pick-up truck he shares with O is parked. He tosses the cooler in the bed. His two rifles are already in there. There's bunch of other junk in the bed, too, his and O's camping gear.

When they get to the range, Gracie kicks off her high heels, peels off her pantyhose, and shoves them in Cory's gear bag. She shoots in standing position, using one of Cory's rifles. Once a hot piece of brass hits her bare foot, but she doesn't care. They tear up those targets until there's nothing but thin shreds of paper left. There's a serene, calm focus while they're doing it. A paradoxical peace.

When they're out of ammunition, they lock up their guns, start a fire, and sit on the "talking space," where, for the first time in the twelve years they've known each other, they don't talk at all. They weep, side by side, and then in each other's arms. When there are no tears left, Cory opens the cooler, digs from his pocket the flat bottle opener Dan used to jokingly call his "beverage entry tool," pops the cap, and hands it to her.

She's never actually had more than sip of beer before. She winces as she drinks it. The bitter brew tastes bad but feels good burning down her throat. Cory doesn't look at her as he drinks. He watches the flames of the fire dance their slow, mesmerizing tango. She goes through two beers and he guzzles three. "I need to wait a bit before I can safely drive us back," he says.

"Then let's look at the stars."

Cory gets two sleeping bags out of the pick-up, unzips them, and spreads them out on the ground, side by side, edges touching. By the time they lay down on their backs, the fire is dying, gasping for life, flailing flames in lingering spurts. They don't need it for warmth. They let it die, let the darkness grow, and look up at the twinkling stars that penetrate the blackness all around.

Cory reaches for her hand. She takes his and rolls on her side and slides instinctively against him. He turns his head and kisses her. She doesn't stop him. She doesn't pull away. His lips are soft and warm and…right. They feel so right against hers.

Somehow, it just happens. She doesn't know how. They're kissing and…it just happens. Her dress feels like a painful wall that she wants torn down. He helps her. She fumbles with the buttons on his shirt, with the clasp on his pants, tugging urgently.

There are no words. He's tender and desperate all at the same time. There are sighs and breaths and gasps and moans, and hot tears that fall on naked, burning flesh and mingle with one another until there's no way to distinguish whose are whose. She needs him, needs to be close to him, wants to feel his body crushing hers, pinning hers, possessing hers. She wants to meld with him, be lost from the world in him.

She feels the pain of penetration for an instant, and he becomes achingly still when she tenses and the hurt hurls through. He speaks his first words since they lay down together, his breath warm against her ear, his voice low and tender. "I love you, Graice. I'll always love you. I'll never try to trap you, but if you ever want me - "

"- I want you."

And then he moves, and she's lost in the moment, in the unpredictable waves of pleasure, in the final crest, and she lies spent in his arms, breathing, swallowing, being. He reaches for the second sleeping bag she's abandoned and pulls it on top of them as a blanket.

Gracie's not sure who drifts off to sleep first.

**/FNL/**

Something avian caws from the trees beyond the range and the sun is just stirring into the sky when Gracie's eyelids flutter open and she finds Cory propped up on one elbow, watching her.

"Do you regret it?" he asks. "It was comfort sex, wasn't it?"

His searching eyes are so tender that she wants to cry and make love to him all at once. "Cory – "

The sound of a truck rumbling up the hill causes him to sit up straight.

"Shit," he says, as the truck reaches flat land and begins to tear across the field toward the range. "It's your dad."

Her black mourning dress lands on her face and the buckle of Cory's belt clangs as he tugs his pants on.


	30. Chapter 30

**Chapter 30**

The door of Dad's truck slams, loud in the still morning. A flock of birds scatters from the distant trees and takes flight like a bad omen. He strides toward them as they scramble to finish clothing themselves. Gracie's dress and underwear are on, but she's not sure where her bra has gone to, and her stockings are mixed in with Cory's empty ammo cases in his gear bag in the truck. Cory's pants are clasped and zipped, but his button-down shirt is open over his muscular brown chest, and his fingers are still fumbling on the first button by the time Dad is an inch away from them.

Dad stands there, eye to eye with Cory. Cory looks down and swallows.

Gracie doesn't know how Dad manages to talk with his teeth all clenched together, but he does. "Have you two been here all night?"

"Yes, sir," Cory mutters to the ground. "We…we meant to go home at the end of the wake, but we fell asleep."

A line jumps in Dad's jaw. "Get your things, Gracie," he says while looking at Cory, "and get in the truck. Now."

She grabs her shoes from the ground.

Dad is still staring down Cory. "Your mother was worried sick about you. Mrs. Taylor and I were worried sick about Gracie. You two don't tell anyone where you're going, and you just disappear overnight? Damn you, Cory! Your mother just lost her husband!"

Gracie's heard Dad yell before. On the football field. But it's just a sound. Sort of a background noise. She's never heard him yell quite this way. This is different. It scares her and causes Cory to step back from him.

Dad closes his eyes and takes in a deep breath. "I know you just lost your father." He opens his eyes again. "But your mother needs you right now. O's there by her side, like a man. And you're here – " He looks at Gracie and almost imperceptibly shakes his head.

Gracie, holding her high heels, walks barefoot to Dad's truck as he trails behind her. She's going to leave the bra behind, wherever it is.

Dad talks into his cell phone and his footsteps fall heavy on the stony, grass-pocked earth: "Babe, I found them. At Dan's range. They fell asleep here. Yeah. Tell Eden he's safe."

He climbs up into the truck just after Gracie gets in. He shoves his cell phone in his pocket and cranks the engine.

"Damn," he mutters after he begins driving. "Damn it!" He slams the flat of one hand against the wheel. "God damn it!"

Gracie bursts into tears. They're almost off Dan's land and to the dirt, side road that will lead them to the highway when he slams on the breaks and jerks the truck into park.

"I'm so sorry!" she sobs. "Please don't be so mad at me. Please don't' – "

"I'm not mad at you! I'm mad because my best friend died!"

He throws open the door with the force of his shoulder and walks briskly over the grass towards Gracie doesn't know what. He swivels and strides back, swivels again. He repeats this six or seven times before he climbs back into the truck.

Gracie looks at her dad, _really_ looks at her dad, for the first time since receiving the news of Dan's death. There are dark bags under his bloodshot eyes. His black hair is salted with more speckles of white and gray than she realized. He closes his eyes and leans his head back against the headrest. "I know you loved him, Gracie," he says. "I loved him too." And then he weeps.

Gracie's seen her father's eyes tear up before. When her nephew Henry was born. When they found that lump in Mom's breast, which turned out to be benign, turned out to be nothing. But he's always turned away. He's never let Gracie _see_ him _weep_.

She throws her arms around his neck and they cry together. Eventually he pulls away and begins driving. Only when they're home and in the driveway and the truck is off does he speak again. "I take it that wasn't planned."

"What?"

"You and Cory. What you did. At the range."

She could pretend she doesn't know what he's talking about, but there's not much point. "No. We were just going to…it just kind of happened."

"So then did you think to use protection?"

She's surprised he's not leaving these questions to Mom. "No. But I never went off the pill from when I thought Paul and I might do it. And I'm a total virgin. I mean, I _was_, so I can't have anything."

"And Cory?"

Gracie hasn't thought of that.

"He's…" she mutters. "I don't know."

Dad just sighs. He might as well have said, _Damn, Gracie_, but he doesn't. "Let's go inside."

In the foyer, Mom throws her arms around Gracie and doesn't scold. She only clings. And when she lets go, she takes Dad into her arms. Henry is in the living room, playing with Mom's new iPad 12. He can't read, but he can download aps.

Gracie slides down onto the couch next to her nephew, and he crawls into her lap. She loves the feel of his warm, snuggly body up against hers, and the smell of his soft, brown hair. She rests her chin on his head and watches him play. Dad disappears upstairs, and Mom follows him, her hand on the small of his back, telling him he needs to go to sleep.

"Lie down with me," Dad says.

Outside the living room window, Gracie sees Matt and Julie drive up to the curb and come out of the car. Probably they were out looking for her, and they've been called and told Dad found her. And apparently they stopped for donuts.

Gracie didn't eat anything at the wake. Sugar sounds pretty good about now.

**/FNL/**

The day wears on. Mom and Dad finally come back downstairs at two in the afternoon. The family never eats lunch or dinner, but snacks on and off all day on the food Eden asked Mom to take home from the wake. Still no one scolds Gracie for passing the night with Cory and not calling. Gracie spends several hours waiting for the other shoe to drop, but no one says the word boo. Julie only seems relieved to see her safe.

Gracie is sure Dad's told Mom's about her and Cory. He tells Mom everything, but Mom doesn't say anything about it. Gracie sits at the dining room table with her mom and sister and looks through the entry way to the living room as Matt flips through channels on the iWanderer and Dad offers his grandson a horseback ride. Henry laughs when Dad rears up and whinnies, and the boy clasps Dad's strong shoulders with his little hands and does his best to hold on. Matt smiles lightly.

Mom and Julie talk about mundane things, but it's a comforting distraction. Julie reaches out and takes one of Gracie's hands, and Mom takes the other, and she knows, with their hands on hers, that life will press on, that time will heal.

**/FNL/**

That night, when Gracie crawls into bed, her cell phone rings. Cory asks her how she's doing and how mad her father was.

"He's mostly mad that Dan's dead."

"But is he still mad at me?"

"I don't _think_ so." Then Gracie asks him what she doesn't want to ask. "Were you a virgin too?"

"I'm absolutely certain I'm free of any STD's," he says. "I would never risk hurting you."

"So that's a no, then?"

"Yes. No. I mean yes, it's a no. I mean…Hannah and I had sex a couple times the second month we were dating, before she broke up with me. We used protection."

Gracie doesn't know why this acknowledgment upsets her so much. Maybe it's because she wishes she could have been his first. And the truth is, she _could_ have been. "Was it…was the sex any different with me? Was it worse, or better, or – "

" - Gracie, don't. It was different because I love you. Because I've loved you for years. What _I_ feel and what _I_ want has _never_ been in question here. You've just got to decide what you want."

"I thought last night made that obvious."

"I won't hold you to what happened. Whatever you decide, last night was something I'll never forget. But I understand the circumstances were unusual and intense. I just hope you don't ever feel like I took advantage of you."

"I don't, Cory. I won't. Not ever. I don't think that at all!"

"Does your father?"

"I don't know what he thinks."

Gracie can hear Eden's voice in the background, and Cory mutters that he has to go.


	31. Chapter 31

**Chapter 31**

The next day no one goes to work, and Gracie stays home from school. Matt and Julie plan to stay a few days. Eden, Cory, and O come to the Taylors' for dinner. When they walk in, Cory kisses Gracie's cheek in shy greeting. She turns her head quickly so that his lips are on her mouth, and then she pulls away before she draws too much attention.

After dinner, Dad says, "Cory, son, come on down to the basement with me."

Cory shoots Gracie an alarmed glance, and Gracie touches his hand lightly just before he follows her father. Mom and Eden retreat with a bottle of wine to the living room, and O plays checkers with Matt in the kitchen nook while Julie and Gracie go sit on the back porch in the rocking chairs. They watch the setting sun silently.

When it's dark, and the moths begin to dance beneath the porch light, Julie asks her, "How are you holding up? He was kind of like a second dad to you, wasn't he?"

"Yeah. I'm…I don't know. Still in shock I guess."

"What's going on with you and Cory? I thought you decided to stop dating. But then…that kiss. And the night before last, you were with him all night?"

"Yeah. We had sex."

"Oh. Did you use - "

"-I'm on the pill." Why do people keep asking her that? She's not irresponsible.

"So…then, you _are_ attracted to him?"

"I didn't think I was before, but we started kissing and…I don't know. I don't know how it happened. It wasn't like fireworks or anything, but it felt really good, and it felt…it just felt so right, Julie. It felt so right."

Julie nods. "Okay," she says. "But I also know this is a difficult time for you, and maybe because of the circum -"

"- It wasn't just comfort sex for me," Gracie insists. "It was more than that. I _know_ it was. Last night, I was trying to imagine what my life would be like without Cory, and I realized I couldn't. I can't see my life without him being a central part of it, and I don't just mean as a friend. I want to _be_ with him. I want to be as close to him as I can be."

The screen door creeps open and Matt puts a hand on Julie's shoulder. He squeezes. "Eden and O are leaving, if you want to say goodbye." Julie rises and so does Gracie.

Everyone exchanges farewells. Eden gets lots of hugs, and O holds open the door for her. "Eric will bring Cory home later," Mom assures her.

Gracie wonders what sort of wringer Dad is putting Cory through down in the basement. When they come up an hour later, though, they just both look tired and a little bleary eyed.

"Matt," Dad says, "Would you drive Cory home? I had a bit too much to drink when we were down there."

Gracie and Julie walk outside with Matt and Cory. Gracie puts a hand around Cory's waist to steady him because he's swaying a little.

Matt mutters to Julie, "Your dad didn't drink with me until I was twenty-five."

"I know," Julie says. "But he did talk with you, after your dad died, didn't he?" Matt nods. She kisses him on the cheek and goes back inside.

"I'll be in the car when you're ready," Matt tells Cory and leaves him alone on the stoop with Gracie.

"How'd it go?" she asks. "You were down there a long time. Did he really chew you out?"

Cory shakes his head. "Nah. He just told me women are to be respected."

"What does _that_ mean?"

"I assume it means I better treat you right. And if you and I ever have sex again, no one should know about it but us. Especially not him."

"Did he say any more?"

"Not about us."

"So what did you _do_ that entire time?"

"We talked. And drank. And played foosball. I didn't even know you had a foosball table under all that junk in the back."

"Neither did I. What did you _talk_ about?"

"A lot of stuff. Mostly, though, he wanted me to know that he's here for me. That he knows he can't replace my dad, but he's here for me."

She puts her arms around him and hugs him close.

His arms surround her, but they're loose, too loose. "I don't think we should see each other for a while."

"What?" A pang of fear shoots through her. She lets go and steps back. "Why not? Did my dad - "

"- No. I just feel guilty. It seems disrespectful for me to be at all happy right now. But I _am_ happy that you seem to want me."

"I _do_ want you," she says, and kisses him, more than once. "But we'll wait, if you think we should."

**/FNL/**

Matt and Julie head back to Chicago. Mom and Dad drag themselves off to work, and even Eden goes back to lecturing because she feels she needs to do something, anything, to keep her mind off her loss. People bring Eden and her sons mountains of food, until their freezer is overflowing, and they borrow the deep freeze in the Taylors' basement.

Mom and Dad begin acting differently around each other. They've always been openly affectionate, but lately Mom _always_ has a hand on him, on his arm, on his neck, on his back…somewhere. He doesn't ever sit in his recliner anymore. He sits next to her on the couch every night, his arm around her, her head on his shoulder. It used to be he'd stay up late some nights looking at game film, or she'd stay up late studying, and one would head off to bed before the other, but now they always go to bed at the same time.

Gracie realizes Mom's afraid that what happened to Dan could happen to Dad. Dan was only 56, after all, and no one saw it coming. One night, when Mom gets up from the couch to go get them a bottle of wine, Gracie sits next to her father and says, "How's your health, Dad?"

He puts an arm around her shoulder and hugs her close. "I just had an appointment last month. Clean bill of health, except my cholesterol's just a little high, but your mother will make sure I eat well, trust me. I'm not going anywhere anytime soon."

When Mom is back she set the bottle on the coffee table and informs them that she's made appointments for all of them with a grief counselor.

"I don't want to talk to some shrink," Dad says.

"I'm a counselor myself, Eric. I'm getting my Ph.D. in psychology. Do you think what I do and what I want to do is useless?"

"No! That's not what I meant. I didn't mean…"

Mom snatches up the bottle and heads back to the kitchen. Dad makes a frustrated, grumbling sound and follows.

Gracie can hear them in there, arguing, voices up and down, starting with Mom: "…know that years ago the marriage counseling worked just…", "yes but…_specific_ problems…tools…", "…Gracie needs…" "…fine for you two …" "…worried about you, Eric!…", "…talking will just make it…", "…all the drinking!...", "…pot calling the kettle…", "…talk it out…", "...got you for that, Tami!...", "…listen…", "…no, you listen…", "…I know that! I respect what you do!..", "…Eric!…" "…can't do this right now. Not now! We … ", "…Eric…", "…I need… ", "…and I need…"

Gracie can't stand it anymore. She starts striding toward the kitchen and is about to burst in screaming, "Stop it! Just stop it!" when she sees they're kissing. Dad's hands are on Mom's back and he's got her pushed against the counter, and her hands are deep in his hair.

They pull apart when she comes in.

Dad catches his breath. "Hey."

"Hey," Gracie says. "Everything all right?"

"Mhmm," Dad says. "We've all go appointments with a counselor."

"So I heard."

**/FNL/**

Gracie doesn't care for the counseling, but she goes along with it because it seems to bring Mom peace that she's doing it. She'd rather be shooting than talking away her pain. "And why do you think that is?" Dr. Morris asks her.

"Because it's more effective," Gracie says. "And because it's a better way to honor Dan."

"Your godfather would disapprove of you getting counseling?" the psychologist asks skeptically.

"That's not what I said. He wouldn't disapprove." _He wouldn't give a shit one way or the other, not that that's any of your damn business._ "He'd joke about it, though. He joked about everything."

"You miss that," Dr. Morris says.

"Yes." _Of course I do,_ _you moron_.

"What else do you miss?"

"Everything."

"Are you angry he died?"

"No. Who is there to be angry at? God?"

"Sure. Why not God?" Dr. Morris asks.

"Fine then. Screw God." Gracie frowns. Dan wouldn't have liked her to say that. He was an agnostic, but he wouldn't have liked it. He would have said it was in poor taste. He was always so proud of his tastes—in music, in wine, and in firearms. "Is our time up yet?"

She can't wait to get home and call Cory, so they can dissect the entire stupid session. She wants to kiss Cory again, to be held by him, to be close to him, to feel him touching her with the most intimate caresses, but they haven't seen each other alone since that one night. They talk on the phone every night, about Dan, about their sadness, and about Cory's plans for college. She confesses to him something she's been feeling for a long time, that she doesn't want to go to college, that she's tired of classrooms, that they fit her about as well as a cell.

"Then don't," he says.

"I'm afraid to tell my parents."

"Well, don't tell them until you have a solid alternative plan, and then it'll be easier for them. What do you want to do?"

"I've been thinking about that. I kind of have an idea."

"Well, tell me about it."

"Why don't I swing by your house Saturday around noon and tell you in person?" She knows Eden lectures a Saturday seminar around that time, and O has spring training for soccer. Cory will be alone in the house. She hasn't seen him alone in two weeks.

"I'd like that. A lot."


	32. Chapter 32

**Chapter 32**

When Gracie arrives at the Harris house Saturday, she immediately falls into Cory's arms. Eventually, she breaks away from his kiss and asks, "Do you want to go to your bedroom?"

He smiles with both surprise and anticipation. "Do _you_?"

She grabs his hand and tugs him up the stairs.

It feels different this time. Not as emotionally intense, but more arousing. When Cory's lying on his back, and her head is on his chest, the comforter perfectly heavy against her bare skin, he strokes her hair and asks, "So…are you my girlfriend now?"

She lifts her head. "I hope so. I mean, what are we doing if not?"

"I just wanted to make sure this wasn't…you know…friends with benefits."

"I don't do that," she says, and settles her head back down.

"So tell me about this idea. You're going to stay in the area, right?" He wants her nearby because he's been accepted to U-Penn. They've offered him both an academic and a football scholarship. He hasn't decided which one he's taking yet. Dad assumes it will be football—after all, why wouldn't he play if he can?—but Gracie knows Cory's having second thoughts about dedicating so much time to the sport.

"I'm thinking of a business plan," she says. "The Taylor School of Marksmanship. I'll set up my own range, have classes a few hours a day, and open the range to the public for shooting during non-class hours. There aren't very many ranges anymore where you can just show up and pay for a lane for an hour." There's the one crowded, indoor range where she and Cory shoot in the winter, but there are no longer any public outdoor ranges within an hour of Phili, other than those on private land, like Dan's. "I already know most of what I need to know. I've been captain of Pemberton Rifle for four years, and I've really enjoyed training the up and coming members. I'm hoping my parents will give me my college fund to invest in my school, but they may just flip out when I ask them."

Cory is silent. His fingertips are like soft feathers on her shoulder.

"Do you think it's a stupid idea?"

"Gracie, you're a smart girl. You're kind of like your Dad – you're not academic-minded, really, but you're _smart_. And so I think if you throw your heart and mind into something – and I know your heart's already in this idea – you're going to succeed. I know you are."

She squeezes him tight. "Thank you," she whispers. "Thank you for the support."

"You've always got my support. Always. And, listen…if your parents say no to giving you the money…you know, my Dad left me his range. I'm eighteen. I legally own it now. I could rent it to you for your school, for a dollar a year."

"A dollar? A year? That's incredibly generous."

"Well, what do I need it for? Other than to shoot, and I can do that when you aren't having classes. I mean, it'll need some updates to bring it up to code for a public range. You'll need to clear some of the land for more lanes. And you'll have to put some kind of plumbing up there. I don't think you can have a public range with just a port-a-potty."

"I was thinking a small club house, with bathrooms, and a big conference room sort of thing, for the lecture part of the class. But if I can't get at my college fund…I'm not sure how I'll pay for that. Do you think I could get a business loan?"

"I think you'll have to work for a few years and save some money first. Prove you can actually make an income."

"Mr. Johnson has told me he'll hire me full time." Mr. Johnson owns the indoor range. Gracie has already worked there part-time during the summers as an apprentice range safety officer, but he's told her more than once that when she turns nineteen, and it's legal, he'd happily put her to work as an instructor as well. "Being a range safety officer doesn't pay that much though. I'll make a little more in a year as an instructor. But I want my _own_ school eventually. With my _own_ curriculum."

She kisses Cory's chest and rolls on her back and looks at the posters slathered on the far wall of his room. There's a wild collage of numbers that shows the places of pi, a spiraled shape called "Infinite Wingdings" from _The Mathematica Gallery Collection_, a poster that says, "You know what seems odd to me? Numbers that aren't divisible by two" and another that says, "Statistics: a precise and logical method for stating a half-truth inaccurately." In the midst of all this is a single Grant Yankees football pendant. "You're not taking the football scholarship, are you?" she asks.

"I don't see how I'm going to get into a good Ph.D. math program if I'm trying to play football. Football just takes too much time. And it's not like I'm going to get drafted by the NFL. I'll just be second string at U-Penn. So, what? I'll play for four years and then…what? Football's not going to be a career for me. I had a lot of fun this past season. It was really good for me. But it's not for me in the long run. I'd like to get my B.A. in three, three and half years at most. I hate to disappoint your dad, though. I don't want to tell him."

She strokes his cheek. "He might take it better than you think. He surprises me sometimes. I thought he was going to murder you in the basement, not give you beer."

Cory chuckles and turns to press his lips against hers. They kiss and pet and cuddle and then drift off to sleep.

Cory's mom gets home earlier than expected, and the shutting of the front door and Eden calling his name wakes them, and they're scrambling for clothes again.

They're dressed by the time she gets up the stairs and knocks on his door. He grabs the nearest math book and opens his door. "Hey, Mom."

Eden glances at Gracie, who has not had a chance to smooth her hair. Gracie looks down and realizes the buttons of her blouse are one off. Eden looks at the blouse and then looks at Cory.

"We were just studying," he says, holding up his textbook.

"Gracie was studying Differential Equations with you?" Cory takes the class at a local community college, because the high school offerings don't go that far. "I thought she was only in Trigonometry."

"Uh…I was just giving her a head start."

"Mhm-huh.. Can I talk to you in the hall for a minute, Cory?"

"Yes, ma'am."

He closes the door behind him, and even though she knows she shouldn't, Gracie hovers near the door and listens.

"Are you using protection?" Eden asks.

"Mom, we were just studying. We – "

"- Coriolanus, answer my question."

"She's on the pill."

"Sweetheart," she says. "This may not be the best time."

"Mom, I'm so sorry. I don't mean any disrespect. You know I'm grieving too. You know-"

"- That's not what I mean. We're all grieving. Gracie too. She may not be…she may be reaching out, Cory, for comfort. And I know how you feel about her. And I just don't want you to have unrealistic expectations about what this is. Because I don't want you to get hurt."

"It's not like that," he insists. "She's my girlfriend now." But Gracie hears his voice quiver.

Later, Cory walks Gracie to her car in the driveway, and his hands are shoved in the pockets of his jeans. She leans with her back against the car, puts her hands on his hips, and pulls him close. His head is bent to the ground so she has to crane her neck to kiss his lips. He doesn't kiss back. "I love you," she says.

"I know. _Somehow_."

"No, Cory. _**Every**_how."

He looks up and his eyes meet hers. "Really?"

"This isn't for comfort," she says. "I mean, it _is_ comforting. But that's not all this is. You know, when I hear a joke, you're the first person I think of sharing it with. And when I have a problem, you're the first person I think of asking for advice. And when I'm sad, I want you to hold me, and…" Now she looks down. "I majorly like having sex with you."

She can feel his lips smiling when he kisses her. The smile fades when he tastes her tears.

"I'm so sorry," she says. "I'm so sorry it took your dad dying for me to realize all this."

"It's okay," he whispers. "We've got each other now. We'll pull through."


	33. Chapter 33

**Author's Note:** I know this got pretty long, but here's hoping more than two people are still reading it. I promise this really is going to come to a close. There are four chapters left, including this one. Enjoy. Your reviews, as always, are very welcome.

**Chapter 33**

April and May pass in a fog of lingering grief, but Gracie's maturing love for Cory blooms beneath the gray cloud and grows out not as some delicate flower subject to the passing winds and rains but as something rooted, stout, and certain. When they aren't in school or working, they spend every moment together, shooting at the range under the supervision of Mr. Thomas (a retired police officer and sometimes gunsmith who was an acquaintance of Dan), frequently eating dinner at each other's houses, hanging out with their mutual friends, and making love snuggled together in the sleeping bag by the flat rock at the range, where they sneak – without guns – twice a week after sunset, sure to return by Gracie's curfew. Sometimes, Gracie lies on her stomach on the Harris living room floor sketching diagrams of the way she wants her range to look while Cory works out proofs on the coffee table, but she has yet to tell her parents of her decision not to go to college.

College brochures keep appearing on Gracie's dresser, on her end table, at the breakfast table, on the kitchen counter, in her gun case. Mom's subtle like that. Gracie supposes Mom hasn't forced the issue before because of Dan's death, but they've all been in counseling for a while now (the sessions with Dr. Morris have turned out to be more helpful than Gracie wants to admit), life is grinding back to normal, and Gracie's already missed the regular application deadlines.

Over dinner one night, Mom says, "So when you are going to start sending off your applications? You graduate in two weeks. There are very few colleges with deadlines as late as June, but there are more with rolling admissions. Have you narrowed it down to four or five? Because with – "

"- I'm not going to college."

Dad's fork hovers in the air for a moment, and then he slowly lowers it to his plate. He looks immediately at Mom, as though he's more afraid of her reaction than shocked by Gracie's announcement.

"Excuse me, sweetie?" Mom says. "It sounded like you just said you're not going to college. But I'm quite sure that can't be what you said."

"No, that's what I said. Dad, would you pass the ice tea?"

Dad turns to Mom, like he's asking permission to pass it.

"Pass the ice tea," she mutters, and he does. As Gracie fills her glass Mom says, "Gracie, sweetie, if you need to delay a semester, I understand. Emotionally, this is a hard time for you to start. You can always wait until spring."

"I'm not waiting until spring. I'm just not going at all. And it's not because I need to grieve. I've been thinking about not going since before Dan died."

"Honey, that's ridiculous," Mom says. "You have to go to college."

"I don't actually _have_ to. There's no law requiring it."

Dad's not saying a word. He's just watching the exchange.

"Then what do you propose to do for the next four years?"

"What most people do, Mom. Work."

Mom pushes her plate forward. "We have a college fund for you, Gracie! We've been saving and saving for years. Do you know they pay differential between someone with a B.A. and someone with a high school degree? And being a girl, it's especially important for you to have something to fall back –"

"—Why? Because I can't fall back on my _brawn_? What do you mean being a girl it's especially important?'

"Because it is!" Mom insists. She stands up and grabs some brochures she's left on the kitchen counter and tosses them on the table. "Now just pick one. Pick one. Close your eyes and do it randomly if you have to."

"Tami, I don't know as – " Mom glares at Dad and he falls silent. Gracie crosses her arms over her chest and stares at the brochures without saying anything. Dad takes a deep breath and speaks again. "Do you have anything like a plan, Gracie?"

"I do." She tells them about the Taylor School of Marksmanship.

"You can't even shoot unsupervised until you're nineteen," Mom says.

"I'll be nineteen in just over a year. In the meantime, I'll work full-time as a range safety officer at the indoor range, and I'll do some gunsmithing on the side for extra income. Dan's already taught me how to do a bunch of stuff, and Mr. Thomas told me I could work with him."

Mom shakes her head.

"And I was hoping maybe you guys would give me the money you saved for my college to invest in The Taylor School of Marksmanship."

"Just give you your college fund?" Mom says. "To _not_ use on college? Are you serious? Do you know what percentage of businesses go belly up in the first two years?"

"Forty-four percent," Gracie says. "So my odds are better than half."

"And how many fail in the next two years after that?" Mom stands up and starts clearing the plates from the kitchen table, even though there's still food on them. "This is ridiculous," she says, clashing them in the sink. "Ridiculous!" She jerks on the water and flicks on the garbage disposal, which seems to echo her anger.

Gracie pushes back her chair. "I'm not you, Mom!" she shouts. "I'm me!"

Mom whirls around from the sink, a look of surprise, hurt, and maybe guilt mingled on her face. Gracie's doesn't try to guess all the emotions, because she storms off to her room instead.

Fifteen minutes later there's a knock on the door. "Mom, I don't want to talk."

"It's me," comes Dad's voice. "Unlock the door."

Gracie does, and he comes in and sits at her desk chair while she sits on her bed and leans back against the wall.

"You shouldn't shout at your mother like that. It's rude, and it makes her feel bad."

"Well she makes me feel bad."

He sighs and drapes an arm around the back of the chair. "Listen, Gracie. Your, Mom, she just worries about you. And she wants you to have a good life. A steady income. We were both poor as children. Your mom had a rough upbringing. When she was girl, there were times she honestly didn't know where her next meal was coming from. She wants you to be secure. And a B.A….that's backup. It is. So would it really kill you to put in the four years, get the damn piece of paper we're going to be paying for anyway, and _then_ start your business?"

"You want me to push through four years of college just so I don't upset Mom?"

"You could take a light course load every semester. Take some guts. Do your hobby on the side."

"It's not a hobby! I want it to be my career! How would you feel if your dad had told you that you could do your football _hobby_ on the side?"

Dad winces. "Fair enough, Gracie. But _I_ went to college. _I_ have a B.A."

"But if you could have played football and coached without going to college, without taking all those extra general requirements you didn't need, would you have?"

He shifts in the chair and doesn't answer.

"And you had a full scholarship, at least. I'd have to spend a hundred thousand dollars to get my B.A. And that would be a complete waste of money, when I could invest all that in my business."

"I don't think your mother is going to agree to give you the money for that purpose."

"But would you?" she asks. "If it was just up to you?"

Dad sighs. "Listen, Gracie. Your mother and I come to decisions together. We'll discuss this. We'll look over the financials and talk about it, and then we'll get back to you. But we intended that money for college. It's in a 529. There'll be penalties if we take it out for non-school use. And it _is_ possible just to change the beneficiary to Henry. And Matt and Julie…they're probably not going to be able to afford college for Henry. Not with how much tuition is going up, not on an artist's salary, with Julie having quit teaching to stay home and write." He stands up. "Go easy on your mother. She loves you, you know." He closes the door behind himself.

Gracie can hear her parents in their room down the hall, arguing. She can't make out all the words. She catches only bits and phrases, like "Come on, Eric," and "Be reasonable, Tami," and "these days it's like a high school diploma," and "if I could have started working at eighteen" and "half of all businesses" and, a couple of times, "Henry."

Gracie grabs her purse and car keys off her desk and throws open her bedroom door. "I'm going out with Cory!" she yells in the general direction of their closed door. "I'll be back by curfew!"

She calls Cory once she's in the car and tells him to meet her at the range. They don't bring guns. When Cory arrives, he's smiling broadly, and he reaches into the bed of his pickup for the sleeping bag.

"No," she says. "I just want to talk."

"Oh," he drops the bag and turns to hide the disappointment flickering across his face.

They make their way to the flat rock. Cory lights a fire because the sun has set. He sits down next to her, and she tells him about her argument with her parents. "I think they're just going to sign the whole fund over to Henry."

"Well, I might be interested in investing in the Taylor School of Marksmanship. I've saved some money from all that tutoring I've been doing." Cory rakes in a pretty high hourly rate helping the kids of parents hellbent on getting their kids into an ivy league college. "I bet Tommy would invest. He's made a shitload from designing that video game too."

She lays her head on his shoulder. "You're sweet, Cory." They look at the stars in silence for a while, and she says, "So I hear you finally told my dad you're taking the academic scholarship."

"Yeah. Did he seem disappointed?"

"A little."

"When I told him, he _looked_ disappointed, but he _acted_ like he wasn't it. He told me he looked forward to seeing me get the Noble Prize in Mathematics one day."

She lifts her head and looks at him. "See, I told you that you didn't have to worry about his reaction."

"The academic scholarship is a lump sum for room and board, so I can get an apartment off campus. You could live with me to save money. It wouldn't cost you anything."

"You're asking me to move in with you?"

"It would be convenient, right?"

"Cory, I don't want to just shack up."

"I didn't realize you were so old-fashioned."

She shrugs. "Well I'm random and weird. You did realize that, right?"

"Yeah. I'm aware of that." She loves how cutely crooked his smile is, the way it curves on just the left side. "Hey, if you prefer, we could get married first."

She laughs. "If I _prefer_? Is this supposed to be a proposal? It's not very romantic."

"I'm not very romantic," he admits. "Listen, I've known for a while I want to spend my life with you. Only reason I suggested living together is I figured _you_ wouldn't be anywhere near ready for marriage. I thought maybe after you lived with me four or five years, you might come around to the idea."

She leans over and kisses his cheek. "I'll tell you what. If you want to marry me, then propose again tomorrow. And ask me _properly_."

He smiles.

"Go get the sleeping bag," she tells him.

They're cuddling in the happy afterglow of their lovemaking when the alarm on his phone sounds. Cory set it in case they fall asleep, so they don't have a repeat of the last two incidents. "We have to get home," he says. "It's late. I'll follow you in my truck to make sure you get there safely."

When she's at her car, she tells him, "I know this sounds majorly old fashioned, but you kind of have to ask my dad for my hand in marriage."

"Gracie, how long have I known your father?"

"Most of your life."

"Yeah. So I'm aware I'm going to have to do that. But I'll wait for your answer first. No sense rattling his cage until I know what you're going to say, right?"

She nods, although she thinks the fact that she told him to ask again tomorrow should make her answer obvious enough.


	34. Chapter 34

**Chapter 34**

That night, when Gracie gets in, Mom is waiting up for her. "I'm sorry," she says from the couch. Her hands are laced between her knees, and she's just sitting there. "I know you're not me, Gracie. I know you have different dreams and ambitions. But I have life experience, and I'd appreciate it if you'd respect that."

"I…okay." Gracie stands just behind the arm chair. She doesn't want to sit down. She doesn't want a lecture.

"A college education is about more than a piece of paper. It's a chance to explore new subjects and discover what you really love. I never once thought of being a counselor until I took psych 101 to fulfill a general requirement."

"I already know what I really love. I _know_ what I want to do."

"It's also a chance to grow and mature."

"And running your own business isn't? Listen, Mom, I can always go back to school later in life if I decide I need to. Like you're doing right now, for your Ph.D."

Mom sighs. "Your father and I are going to think about your business proposal. We're going to seriously consider it and discuss it some more."

"Okay." Gracie shifts uncomfortably from one foot to the other. "So…uh…can I go to bed now?"

Mom nods.

When she's just out of the living room, Mom's voice drifts after her, "I love you, Gracie Belle."

"I love you too, Mom."

**/FNL/**

The next night Cory takes Gracie out for a nice, sit-down dinner. It's not as if there's candlelight and strolling violinists, but there's a white tablecloth and fancy water glasses. She's thinking he'll get down on one knee on the floor and propose right there in front of everyone. But he doesn't. He just takes her home after and kisses her goodnight.

**/FNL/**

The night after that, Cory takes her for a walk around a lake. He keeps putting his hand in his pocket. She thinks she knows what's coming, what he's checking for.

But it never comes.

**/FNL/**

On Thursday night, Gracie sits down to dinner with her parents for the first time in days. After she's cleared the plates and Mom has washed the dishes and Dad has opened and poured the wine, her parents tell her to stay at the table.

"Your father and I have discussed your proposal," Mom says. "And we've come up with a compromise."

Dad's hand is resting on the bottom circle of his wine glass, but he's letting Mom do the talking.

"I really wish you'd get your B.A.," Mom continues. "I think you'll be missing out on a lot if you don't go. College is a chance to develop your love of lifelong learning."

Gracie flutters her eyelids in an attempt to hide her rolling eyes. "It's also a chance to go to parties and get wasted and hook up with random guys."

"Gracie," Dad says sharply. "You're not helping your case."

"You don't _have_ to do _any_ of that in college," Mom insists. "Your dad and I didn't."

Dad looks down at the table and suppresses a smile.

"Well we didn't randomly hook up with anyone anyway. Your father and I dated each other steadily until we got married after our sophomore year."

"I really don't want to go to college, Mom. I feel like I'd be wasting precious time I could be using to do what I really know I want to do. And money. I don't like that kind of school, where it's mostly academic, not hands-on, where you're just sitting in a desk most of the time with people blabbing at you. It's not that I don't like learning. You know I teach myself stuff all the time. I taught myself to change the oil on my car just last month." She'd done it in their driveway and brought down the wrath of the HOA, who said that wasn't allowed.

"I know, sweetie. That's why I said we've come up with a compromise. Your father and I would like you to go to community college for two years. Get your associates in business or accounting or a related field that will help you if you really want to be an entrepreneur. There are things you need to learn about running a business. Just two years, not four. And once you have your associates, we'll give you the rest of the money in the college fund, minus the penalties, for your business."

Gracie traces a line in the wooden kitchen table.

"It's a good compromise," Dad says. "It's reasonable."

Gracie nods. "Okay," she says. "Thank you. I could go to the cheapest community college I can find. Do some less expensive online classes too. That would still leave a decent chunk to invest."

"You're also welcome to continue to live with us to save money for the next four years," Mom says. "Cory's going to U-Penn, so I know you want to be near him anyway."

She doesn't tell Mom that she's hoping to be living with Cory. After all, he still hasn't followed through with his proposal.

**/FNL/**

On Friday, after Mom's taken about a thousand graduation pictures, Gracie skips her all-night graduation party and hangs out at the pizza joint with Cory, Sandra, and O. When Sandra and O eventually wander off to go "camping," Cory asks, "So what do we do now? Want to go to the party?"

"Cory. Seriously. Who are you asking that question?"

"Yeah. Me neither." He graduated three days ago, second in his class, O having beaten him by .005 GPA points. ("Because he took those guts," Cory grumbled. "Literary Magazine. That's not a _real_ class. And Drama? How do they even grade that?") He smiles. "Want to go _camping_?"

"We just went _camping_ this afternoon."

They end up going back to Gracie's house to watch her past recordings of _Master Marksman_. They pop in to the kitchen to grab some drinks and snacks where Dad is sitting at the table surfing the Internet. "Mind if I have one of these beers?" Cory asks, his head still in the fridge.

"As long as you don't share it with Gracie," Dad answers. "She's not quite legal yet, you know." Two months until she's eighteen. "And I'm trusting you."

"Yes, sir."

"And just _one_, son. Too much drinking is not going to help you win that Noble Prize in Mathematics."

"It's _Nobel_, Dad, not _Noble_," Gracie says, shaking her head. "My dad," she laughs as they walk to the living room.

"You realize that's not even the funniest part, right?" Cory asks her as they settle onto the couch and put their feet up on the coffee table.

"It's not?"

"I mean, there _is_ no Nobel Prize in Mathematics. It's kind of a sore point."

"Now I feel stupid."

He puts an arm around her. "Everybody's stupid about something. Even me."

She laughs and kisses his cheek. They turn on the iWanderer and pull up a fleece blanket over themselves, even though it's summer. It feels good to be close and warm. Gracie tries to snag his beer a few times, but Cory won't let her. "Stop it," he hisses. "I'm serious. I don't want to cross your Dad."

"I don't even really like beer," she says. "I just love your reaction. You're a little afraid of my dad." How is Cory going to ask for her hand in marriage? Assuming he still wants to, that is, because he still hasn't officially re-proposed.

"Gracie, respect is not the same thing as fear."

A few minutes later, Mom passes behind the living room couch on her way from the upstairs study to the kitchen. She pauses just behind them and hollers, "Eric, hon, they have a blanket!"

Dad comes out to the living room and puts his hands on his hips and shakes his head at Mom, who steps forward and kisses him lightly on the lips. He takes Mom's hand and tugs. "It's gettin' late. Nite, you two."

"I can't believe you're leaving them alone with a blanket," Mom teases as they head toward the staircase.

"Right now I'm more interested in our blanket," Dad says.

"What was that all about?" Cory asks.

"Beats me."

**/FNL/**

On Saturday afternoon, Gracie meets Cory at the range. Dan's friend Mr. Thomas supervises. After they shoot and retreat toward the talking space, Mr. Thomas announces he has to run an errand and that he'll be back in an hour and they can shoot again then. His truck disappears in a cloud of dust.

Gracie reaches down into the cooler and pulls out a Diet Dr. Pepper. Cory always remembers her favorite. The can feels weirdly light, but it's completely sealed. She wonders if there a factory error as she pops the tab.

Confetti shoots up into her face, and she yelps. After the confetti has flung free of the can, a tiny, rolled up scroll of paper emerges from the hole. She pulls it out, unrolls it, and reads the note, "Will you marry me?"

She laughs. When she looks up from the paper, Cory has slid off the rock and is on one knee before her, and he's holding a solitaire in his hand. "So?" he asks, "Will you?"

She nods, and he slides the ring on her finger and kisses her.

When he's next to her on the rock again, she asks, "Did you design that can?"

"Yeah." He smiles timidly. "Was it romantic?"

"It was…surprising."

He frowns.

"And memorable. I won't forget that. And really sweet." She kisses him. "For a while I thought you changed your mind. That you weren't going to ask again."

"I was waiting to get the ring. I had to see my grandma. It's hers."

"Doesn't she want it?"

Cory shakes his head. "My grandpa got her a better one for their 50th. Is it okay? I thought – "

"- Julie has Matt's grandma's ring. I think it's a good omen, actually." She puts her hand with the ring down on the rock and admires it. "Now, are you ready to officially ask my dad for his permission? We can do it together if you want."

"You ought to know your father better than that. This is something I need to do man to man."

"But I want to be there."

They argue about it, and Cory compromises. He agrees he'll ask her Dad when he's over at the Taylor house for dinner one night. Gracie will excuse herself when the dialogue is about to occur so that she won't be tempted to join the exchange, but she'll be near enough that she can hear it.

**/FNL/**

"This will not go well." There's a loud scream of _Nooooooo!_ in the background, as if to emphasize Julie's point.

"What was that?" Gracie asks. She's sitting cross-legged on her bed spread.

"Henry is resisting his bedtime. Matt has to sit and wait outside his door and put him back to bed every time he comes out. It took an hour last night. We should be down to half an hour by tomorrow."

"Sounds painful. Why don't you just let him watch shows until he falls asleep?"

"Oh, Gracie. Gracie, Gracie, Gracie. Sometimes you can be really naïve. Maybe you shouldn't get married when you turn eighteen."

"You and Matt did."

"We were a little bit older," Julie tells her. "And it was a different time."

"But I'm _sure_ I want to marry Cory. I'm as sure as I am of my target with a rimfire scope."

"Uh…okay, that metaphor's lost on me."

"I mean, okay, I didn't expect it the first time he suggested it. But as soon as he did, it seemed the only logical conclusion. I don't need to get to know him better. Do you know how many hours we've spent talking over the years? And now that I _know_ I _love_ him, and the sex is good, what's the point of waiting? Tell me that."

"Well, it's just that marriage requires hard work. Compromise. It requires two people who are really willing to listen to one another. Two people, who for the rest of their lives - "

" - yada, yada, yada. You know what I think, Julie? I think no matter when you get married, you end up having to learn on your feet. Just like with shooting. But maybe if you start early, the training's actually easier. There are fewer fixed habits you have to correct. You're better braced for the recoil because you haven't built up a fear of it."

Julie laughs. "You know what? In some ways, you're already more mature than I was at nineteen. And Matt and I survived marriage. So I guess maybe I should stop trying to talk you out of it. Besides, _I_ don't need to. Dad's going to flip when Cory asks for his blessing. So's Mom. She'll just maintain a lower volume when she's spazzing."

"You think?"

"Dad told Matt his answer would be no until the sun burns out."

"That's a bit harsh, isn't it? Did he used to hate Matt or something?"

"No. He loved him, and he still flipped. But who knows. Maybe I'm wrong. Dad's totally different with you. Hell, for all I know, he'll break out the champagne and the cigars."

"Julie! Help!" comes Matt's voice.

"Gotta go. Henry control. Good luck."

Gracie hangs up the phone. _Good luck._ She's suddenly got a heavy feeling she's going to need it.


	35. Chapter 35

**Chapter 35**

Gracie, Dad, and Cory start out in the kitchen together, Dad talking football with Cory and Gracie setting the table in the kitchen nook since it will just be the three of them for dinner tonight. Mom is at a seminar.

As Dad stirs the chili he's weirdly proud of, Gracie says, "I need to go make a phone call," gives Cory a knowing look, and slips from the kitchen to the adjoining dining room, which is partitioned just enough that Dad can't see her when she sits down at the table.

"So next season," Dad says, "in your absence, I was thinking of starting Rodriguez, and – "

" - Sir, you know I love your daughter."

From his voice, Dad sounds peeved by Cory's odd interruption. "Uh…yeah. I'm aware."

"And I have for a long time."

"Uh-huh.

Cory's voice grows a little louder, more assertive. "And I want to marry her. And I'd like to ask you for her hand in marriage."

There's a clanking of pans.

Gracie grips the edge of the dining room table. She's ready for Dad to shout, but his voice is a normal volume and only a little tight when he says, "And if I say no? Will you marry her anyway?"

"I…uh…" Cory is clearly unprepared for this question. "I'd prefer not to go against your wishes. So if you say no, I suppose I'll wait for you to come around. For a time, anyway. I won't wait forever. And I'd rather get married this August so she can move in with me at U-Penn and we can start our life together."

"And she can't move in with you unless you get married?"

"She doesn't want to. She doesn't want to just live together. When Gracie does something, she does it…uh…"

"Whole hog?" Dad asks.

"Yes, sir. And I like that about her. It's one of the forty-three qualities that make me love her."

"Forty-three? Did you make a list?"

"Once. Just in my head. It's not like I wrote it down or anything."

Gracie can imagine Dad's expression. That I-shall-not-be-amused look he gets. "What's your plan, exactly? To support yourselves?"

"My scholarship money will cover housing. I'll work part-time as a math tutor while I earn my B.A., which I expect to finish in three years, because I've already earned a bunch of credits through AP tests and community college classes. While she gets her associates, Gracie will work as a range safety officer. Later, I can intern as a quant while I'm working on my doctorate. It pays well, and once I have the Ph.D., it'll pay even more. I'll work as a quant for another four years after I get my Ph.D., just to bank some money, and then I'll probably become a professor and do theoretical research."

"A _what_?" Dad asks. "A kwon?"

"Quant."

"Son, I have no idea what that is."

Gracie smiles. (She didn't know either, until Cory told her, "Quants are like the rocket scientists of Wall Street, but you don't have to work on Wall Street these days. I can stay in Phili and do it all via Internet.)

"A quantitative analyst," Cory tells him.

"That's still not helping me."

"I'll do statistical arbitrage or maybe algorithmic trading."

"Nevermind. Just tell me – what does that pay?"

When Cory says what he expects his starting salary to be the first year after he has his Ph.D., Dad is deathly silent. Gracie wonders if he's simply fallen over. She wants to peek around the corner to see, but she doesn't. Dad finally replies, "Son, that's about what I make **_now_**. After thirty-two years at my career."

"So, you see, I'll be able to support your daughter very comfortably when I'm done with my Ph.D., even if her firearms school doesn't work out. But I believe in her. I think she'll make it work."

"Uh-huh. How old are you, son?"

"Eighteen."

"How old is my daughter?"

"Almost eighteen."

"Uh-huh," Dad says again. Gracie wonders what's going on in that kitchen. Is Dad cleaning up? Cooking? Just staring Cory down? "I don't understand why this keeps happening in my family. Eighteen, nineteen year old boys asking me for my daughters' hands in marriage."

"I love your daughter. Very much."

"Your love is not in question here, Cory. And you know I like you. Hell, I love you like my own. And I know you're the kind of young man who would be a faithful husband and a good provider. So you know there's nothing personal when I ask you this. How long have you dated my daughter?"

"About three months, sir."

"Three months. Do you hear yourself when you say that? Three months? Do you hear those words coming out of your mouth?"

"Yes, sir."

"Uh-huh. I think that's what they call a whirlwind courtship."

"Yes, sir."

"Cory, did you get my daughter pregnant?"

"No, sir. I did not."

"Then what's the rush, exactly?"

"I don't see it as a rush. We've both graduated from high school, we both have firm plans and a housing opportunity. I've loved Gracie for years, and though she's only loved me that _way_ for a couple months, she's known me since we were kids, and we've always been close. We know each other through and through. There's nothing I'm going to learn about her in the next few years that's going to make me not want to marry her. And whatever struggles come up, I'm committed to working through them. And I…I just don't want to waste any time."

The silence is so long, Gracie wants to peek in, but she doesn't. She sits and waits. She hears pans moving. One clunking into the sink. "Gracie," her Dad hollers. "I know you're around the corner there. Come on in."

She creeps cautiously into the kitchen.

As Dad turns off the burner and moves the chili pot to the side, he asks, "Do you want to marry this young man?"

"Yeah. I do."

Dad turns to face her. "You sure about that?"

She nods.

Dad studies her expression as he wipes his hand on a kitchen towel. He tosses the towel on the counter. "Y'all c'mere a minute."

Gracie shoots Cory a puzzled look as Dad starts walking toward the stairs that lead to the basement. Cory shrugs and follows, but when Dad clambers down the stairs he pauses. "You don't think he's leading me down there to shoot me, do you?" he whispers.

She chuckles. "I don't know. You first."

Cory creeps down the stairs, Gracie a step behind him.

Dad is at the far end of the basement, in the storage room that is packed to the gills with boxes of junk. Dad used to joke, "You'll have to put all that in the estate sale, Gracie." Obviously, he hasn't joked like that since Dan died.

"I know it's in here somewhere," he says, rummaging through one box and then another.

Cory leans against the door sill and Gracie sits on a metal folding chair inside the room.

"Aha!" Dad pulls out a piece of yellow, lined, legal-sized paper. "There it is." He hands it to Cory. "Your father and I had a few beers one night when Gracie was about six or seven. Mrs. Taylor was out with your mom, and Gracie kept bugging us for cake even though I already gave her a big ol' slice after dinner. And your dad – who always did have a way with the business speak – drew up that little contract between me and Gracie."

Gracie stands and reads it over Cory's shoulder. A smile eases its way across Cory's lips, and Gracie chuckles. "I, Gracie Belle Taylor," reads the so-called contract in Dan's neat cursive, "being of sound mind and body, and greatly desiring additional cake, do hereby agree to permit my father, Eric Jackson Taylor, to choose my husband for me. I retain the right to consent to said match, or to reject it; however, I forthwith contract not to marry anyone whom my father does not agree is good enough for me. In consideration of this promise, my father has given to me this day more cake. Signed – " And there Gracie scrawled her name in her undisciplined, first grade print.

"So you see," Dad says, "I have it in writing, Gracie."

Cory laughs. "My father was a consummate smart ass." Then he sucks in his bottom lip and blinks back the tears threatening to brew in his eyes.

"He sure was," Dad agrees. "He made me laugh. All the time." He puts a hand on Cory's back, just below his neck. "He was a good man, your father." He slides his hand away and puts both his hands on his hips, that stance he sometimes takes on the football field, when he's about to say something serious to his players. "And you're a good man too, Cory. Like your father. And I think we all realize now…life is short. Too damn short. So if you want to marry my daughter, you have my blessing."

Cory, not looking at his godfather, still trying to control his emotions, nods. "Thank you, sir."

"But if you ever hurt her…you know. Insert the appropriate threat here."

Cory's burst of breath is a half a laugh, half a tamped-down sob. "Excuse me," he says, and disappears from the storage room.

Gracie tries to follow but Dad stays her with a hand on her arm. "Give him some space, Gracie Belle."

She watches Cory go and thinks Dad is right, that this is a moment when he needs to be alone. She turns to her father, "Thank you, Dad," she says and hugs him.

With his arms around her, Dad says, "You've still got to tell your mom. And don't expect us to necessarily be on the same page on this one. We aren't always, you know."

"I've lived with you guys for a while. Trust me, I know."

But if Dad's on her side, what does she have to worry about?


	36. Chapter 36

**Author's Note: **This is the last chapter, but a brief epilogue will follow. Thanks for sticking with me this far, and your reviews are very much appreciated!

**Chapter 36**

Gracie tells Mom alone. She isn't expecting much resistance. After all, Dad was the one who always said Gracie had her whole life to get married, whereas Mom was the one who fretted when Gracie displayed more interest in guns than in guys and who has always dropped hints about wanting more than one grandbaby.

Mom just blinks at first. Then she says, "You absolutely are _not_ getting married on August 28th."

"That's the date we've picked."

"That's just two months from now, Gracie Belle."

"Well we don't want a big wedding. Family and close friends only. Very simple. We don't need much time to plan for - "

"- I'm not concerned about the wedding plans!" Mom goes on to tell Gracie she's too young, that the relationship needs more time to grow, that she and Cory need more time to heal from Dan's death, that marriage is a serious, lifelong commitment, and that they should just live together first.

"Really? You'd rather we shack up than get married?"

"Marriage isn't a cake walk, and you can't just take back a vow."

"I don't intend to take it back. And I know it's not a cake walk." Gracie's not really sure what a cake walk is. Is that when they play music and if you stop on the right number you win a cake? Because she's certainly never thought marriage was anything like gambling for food.

Mom ends the conversation by saying, "Think about it awhile longer."

Gracie hears Mom and Dad in their bedroom that night, arguing over it, Mom saying, "Marriage isn't going to be as easy as she thinks it is. It requires a maturity I'm not entirely sure she possesses yet."

"I've thought of that, babe. Trust me, I have. But you know what else I've thought of? I wasn't mature enough when I married you either. _Marriage_ matured me. And then fatherhood matured me even more. I think marriage matured Julie too."

"Yes, that can happen. But the other thing that can happen is that it all falls apart."

"Well, Cory's a rare eighteen-year-old. He's mature enough for the both of them."

"You just want Cory to strike while the iron is hot, to marry her while she's willing so she doesn't end up with some boy you don't like."

"Don't tell me you don't think he's good for her."

"I'm not telling you that. But how could you just go and give her your blessing without even talking to me about it first?"

"First of all, _my_ blessing is _mine_ to give. _You_ don't get to veto _my_ blessing. Second of all, this isn't about you. It's about Gracie."

"I know it's about Gracie! If only you had talked to me first, we could have gone to her _together_ and told her why it's a bad idea!"

"Well, Tami, I don't think it's such a bad idea."

"And why not? After the way you reacted when Matt and Julie got engaged?"

"Well maybe I learned something from that, babe. They're still married, aren't they?"

"But Gracie's only dated Cory three _months_, not on and off for three _years_. And you know Matt and Julie were on the verge of divorce once."

"So were we, Tami. So is almost any couple, given enough time. They'll be on the verge, sooner or later. It's whether or not they have the strength to step back that matters, whether they try or just give up. Character's in the trying. Taylors know that. Even Gracie."

"Three months, Eric. They've been dating three months."

"I know. It seems quick to me too. I thought maybe he knocked her up, and I was glad it wasn't that. But, you know, they've been friends for over twelve years. And he's loved her for at least three of those. And she's loved him too, and for longer than three months. She just didn't know it right away. Like Hastings with football. He had to be _told_ he loved football. But it was in him all along."

"Oh, Lord, Eric. You and football. You think it's a metaphor for all of life."

"Because it is."

"I don't doubt their love for each other, sugar, but we're talking marriage. At eighteen! Remember how hard it was for us, those first two years, when we were still in college?"

"So you regret marrying me?"

"That's not what I said! I just…it wouldn't have hurt us to wait a few years."

"It would have hurt me, Tami, because you would have wound up with that guy from – "

"- Oh I would not – "

" – I had to clamp you down when I had the chance."

"Clamp me down? Is that what you're hoping Cory will do? Clamp Gracie down before she makes a worse choice?"

"Well, I think just about any other choice would be worse, because I think he's the right guy for her. You don't?"

"I think they're young. I _know_ they're young. I think they haven't dated long. Don't tell me you aren't worried about it."

"Of course I'm worried about it!" Dad half shouts. "But I also know how damn stubborn Gracie is. She's going to do what she wants no matter what. I'd rather she do it with the support of her parents than without, and I'd rather _not_ put Cory in a position of having to defy me to please her. So I gave them my blessing. I want them to be happy."

"So do I, Eric, but they're making this decision on the heels of a major loss. Don't you see what's concerning about that?"

"I might if I didn't think they already loved each other before Dan died. I might if his death hadn't made me realize that I want every year I can possibly get with you. That I'm glad we didn't wait, even if you apparently wish you'd sowed some more wild oats."

"Lord, Eric. I sowed plenty of oats. I'm well aware the grass is _not_ greener on the other side. Gracie, on the other hand, has never had sex with anyone but Cory."

"Well, there's not much she can do about that now if she's going to end up with him, except cheat on him. Or break up with him and then get back together with him like Julie did with Matt. Would you like her do that? Have a chance to have a little adulterous fling with a T.A.?"

_Adulterous?_ Julie didn't mention that little detail.

Gracie's parents have always been unaware of how well their voices carry in this house when they're arguing, and she feels suddenly guilty for eavesdropping. Now seems like a good time to take a walk around the block.

**/FNL/**

After Sunday lunch, Mom clears the kitchen table and then tells Gracie to get in the car. "Why?" she asks.

"Well," Mom says, "don't we need to go shop for wedding dresses?"

Gracie smiles, thrilled that Mom has come around so quickly, but while they browse the bridal store, Mom talks softly to her. "Cory just lost his father. He's still grieving. So is his mom. I don't doubt your love for him. But you know…"

Gracie lowers her eyes so Mom won't see her rolling them.

"Gracie, if you rush into this marriage, Cory might doubt your love, from time to time. He's loved you for a long time. A lot longer than you've loved him. He _needs_ to know you love him too. To _really_ know it. He deserves to know that. So if you wait a year to marry him, just a year, that accomplishes two things: one, it gives Eden more time to grieve her husband before she has to officially give away her son to another woman. Two, it gives Cory time to know your love is certain, that he didn't just tie you up while the moment was ripe, in the wake of a trauma. And then you won't have to spend the next ten years of marriage convincing him that you would have married him anyway."

Mom caresses the subtle embroidery accenting a dress on a mannequin. "This one's beautiful. You'd look great in it."

**/FNL/**

When Gracie tells Cory that she thinks they should delay the wedding for a year, he asks, "So you're okay with living together before we're married?"

"No," she answers. "We'll keep dating, but I'll live with my parents for now. I just don't…I don't want to live together until we're married."

"Why? It's not like we aren't already having sex. Who do you think you're fooling?"

"It's just where I draw the premarital line. Not at sex but at living together."

"You know, I think I've told you this before, but you're kind of arbitrary."

"That's not one of the forty-three qualities that make you love me?"

"No."

Cory decides not to get his own apartment with the scholarship money. He lives at home with his Mom instead. "Maybe this delay is for the best," he tells Gracie. "She needs me there, with Dad gone and O in New York." He commutes to U-Penn, and Gracie attends classes at a local community college. She gradually makes improvements on the range with the money she earns as a range safety officer and the money Cory and her friend Tommy "invest." ("I'll pay you back with interest," she insists. "You'll pay Tommy back," Cory says. "You and I will have it all in one pot eventually.")

After a year, Mom starts asking subtlty when they plan to get married, especially since Cory ends up spending the night once a week at the Taylors and Gracie once a week at Cory's house. "Your Dad doesn't like having to pretend you're not sneaking out of your bedroom down the hall to the guest bedroom."

"Then he should stop pretending," Gracie says.

"Oh, Lord no, he couldn't do that. But if you were married, he wouldn't have to."

Gracie takes special delight in drawing out the engagement a second full year. She doesn't do it just to torture the mother who insisted she was too young to marry in the first place but who now wants her to get on with it. She does it because she wants to get married on the range, as I kind of homage to Dan, and they'll need plumbing if they're going to have a wedding and reception there. She'll have her Associates in Entrepreneurship in May, and then she can raid the rest of her college fund to finish the clubhouse.

Matt's career as an artist has finally taken off. For the last year, he's been concentrating on his "real art." Julie, meanwhile, has been focusing on her writing. The same day Gracie broke ground on the clubhouse, Julie's first book hit the shelves, a nonfiction work titled _What I Learned from My Mother_. It's a book about marriage and parenting, and it's been selling steadily. Julie has also written two novels, but she hasn't found a publisher for either one of them yet. Because they both work from home, they're able to visit when the mood strikes them, and they come for a weekend in April.

One night, after Mom and Dad are in bed and they're hanging out in the living room, Matt makes a reference to Gracie and Cory's "epic engagement."

"We were engaged for an entire year," Julie reminds him.

"Yeah, but they'll have been engaged _twice_ as long." Matt shakes his head. "Well, in four months, when they get married, maybe the pressure will _finally_ be off of _us_ to produce a second grandchild."

Julie smiles weakly. "I guess that would be good," and something in the way she says it catches Gracie's attention, draws her eyes to her sister.


	37. Chapter 37

**Epilogue**

"Henry, stand still!" Julie Saracen straightens the bowtie on the tiny tuxedo of her son. He'll start kindergarten this fall. She stands up and smooths out her bridesmaid dress, which is tight across her pregnant belly. She's five months along. They had to let out the dress just before the wedding, but Julie looks gorgeous and glowing.

Matt called the pregnancy "a happy accident." Julie was afraid to tell him at first, since they'd agreed to stop after one, but Mom assured her Matt wasn't going to be upset, that he'd be much happier than she suspected.

"I've been in your shoes," Mom said. "And I was nervous too. But trust me. Matt's going to handle it better than you think."

Julie gave Gracie the full report afterward, that Matt swept her up into his arms and spun her around and laughed and said, "I didn't want to stop at one. I just said yes because you wanted to."

Cory has already earned his bachelor's. With a full course load every semester, summer classes, and all the credits he earned in high school, he pushed through his degree program in just two years. He's been accepted to a graduate program at Princeton University, which is just a thirty minute commute from where they'll be living north of the range.

Mom has earned her doctorate and is looking for a teaching job at a university. She has applications in at four schools within an hour of Philadelphia, several across New England and the south east, and one as far away as California.

"Tami, we're not west coast people," Dad keeps saying. After two years of being courted with increasingly sweetened deals, he finally accepted an assistant coaching position at Penn State. He had to pull some strings to get away from summer training for Gracie and Cory's wedding.

"What will you do if you get a position outside of Pennsylvania?" Gracie asked her mother last month. "Surely Dad's not going to quit his new job."

"We might try the long distance thing," Mom answered. "We won't have kids this time, so it won't be as hard. I'll rarely see your Dad during football season anyway, not with this college gig. That's one hard job on a family, which is probably why he's only been a high school coach for so long, despite all the times opportunity's pounded on his door." She sighed. "But you'll be moving out and we'll just be a couple again. And if we sell the house and keep two condos, we can enjoy two different parts of the country and come together as often as our jobs allow us. Absence makes the heart grow fonder. It might be kind of exciting. Like dating all over again."

Gracie can't imagine Dad with his own bachelor's pad, but they can certainly afford two households now that, with his bonus, he might manage to pull in almost half a million this year.

Gracie has nearly finished the clubhouse and has updated much of the range, and she expects to open The Taylor School of Marksmanship next spring. She's not changing the name, even if she's changing hers. Today, the range has been temporarily transformed by a sea of flowers and some makeshift gazebos and rows and rows of folding chairs. Gracie is getting dressed in the conference room of the clubhouse.

Mom helps her fasten her dress in the back. Julie starts dispensing marriage advice, much of it straight from her recently published book. "I've learned a few keys to happiness in my sixteen years of marriage," she says. "And a lot of them Mom tried to teach me, but I admit I had to learn them on my own all over again."

Mom shakes her head.

"But the most important ones," Julie continues, "and I think Mom will agree with me on this, are honesty and communication and compromise. Right, Mom?"

"Well, Julie babe," Mom says, tucking back her hair, which she resolved to stop dying last month, letting it gray in unexpected, arresting ways, "honesty and communication and compromise are very important, but I think there's really only _one_ key to a truly lasting marriage."

Julie raises an eyebrow. "Well you told me honesty and communication and compromise when Matt and I got married."

"So what is it?" Gracie asked. "What is the key to a truly lasting marriage?"

Mom smiles her brilliant, southern smile and says in her charming, Texas accent, "Honey, the key to a happy and long-lasting marriage is this: Lower your expectations."

"I heard that!"

They all turn to see Dad, looking rather regal in his tuxedo, his hair as thick as ever, but more silver-gray than it was two years ago.

Mom saunters over to him and wraps her arms around his neck. "Sugar, you know it's true."

He kisses her and then says, "Lucky for you, I lowered mine years ago."

"Mhmmm," she murmurs and kisses him back. Then she steps out of the way so he can see Gracie.

"Holy shit," he mutters.

"Eric!" from Mom and "Dad!" from Julie.

"Come on!" he says. "There are no other words to describe it."

Gracie giggles. He comes and hugs her. He feels a little unsteady on his feet, swayed by some half-repressed emotion. "I hate to give you away, peanut, but I couldn't ask for a better son-in-law."

"I heard that!"

They all turn to see Matt, looking especially handsome in _his_ tuxedo. He's going to be a groomsman, along with Malcolm and, of course, O, who is the best man. Julie is Gracie's matron of honor, and Sandra and Tommy are her bridesmaids. ("Tommy's not going to wear a dress is he?" Dad asked. "He's gay, Dad. He's not a transvestite." And Mom: "This is how it's done now, sugar. Girls and boys stand up for both the bride and the bridegroom. You can have male bridesmaids and female groomsmen." And Dad, grumbling about the assault on tradition.)

Matt smiles when he sees Julie sighing with exasperation and picking up the pillow Henry has just thrown like a frisbee. At least it doesn't have the rings on it yet.

"Awww…Julie," Matt says, "don't worry about it. You know he's not going to do it right. Gracie doesn't care, do you, sis?"

Gracie shakes her head.

"Son," Dad says, clasping a hand down on Matt's shoulder. "You know I didn't mean that as a slight on you. I meant I couldn't ask for a better son-in-law for _Gracie_."

"I know," Matt says. "I was your first pick of the Panthers. Even before Landry." He steps closer to Gracie and tells her, "I finished that wedding portrait for you, but there wasn't exactly room for it on the gift table, so I'm going to ship it to you later."

"Thanks, Matt. I appreciate it. You're an amazing artist."

He nods. "I know." But he says it with his trademark, self-deprecating smile.

"All, y'all men," Mom says loudly, "Get _out_ of here!"

"A'ight, A'ight," Dad and Matt say as they back out of the room.

As they do, Gracie sighs and wishes that her godfather were with them.

She turns back to the mirror as Julie slides on her veil for her. She looks at herself in the oval-shaped glass through the mesh fabric that Cory will lift in a few minutes, in order that the hidden may be revealed. Sometimes life is like that mesh veil, Gracie thinks. You may think you know what's under there; you can see the vague form, but until the veil is gone, and the light shines in all its revealing warmth, you don't know, not really.

And you might be surprised by what you find.

**THE END**


End file.
